


The Other Argent

by Thedeanael



Series: The story of Stella Argent [2]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alpha Pact, Beacon Hills High School, Fanfiction, Teen Wolf, The Nogitsune - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-07
Updated: 2020-06-10
Packaged: 2021-02-28 20:35:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 25
Words: 225,082
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23053312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thedeanael/pseuds/Thedeanael
Summary: Stella Argent's story continues as she comes back to Beacon Hills.
Series: The story of Stella Argent [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1753387
Kudos: 4





	1. TATTOO

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the follow-up story to 'The New Argent' and again, if you're still here THANK YOU SO MUCH! And sorry in advance for all the typos!

School started only few days after Stella came back to Beacon Hills and she was still ranting about how she was back here, and she couldn’t get any rest. However, jet-lag was the worst and, somehow, Beacon Hills still felt worse than that.

It was her choice to be here, but she still hated Beacon Hills for obvious reasons.

First of all, she had no friend. Even though Jackson and she were friends, after turning into a real werewolf and getting werewolf 101 from Derek, he moved to London and no one has ever heard from him since then.

Second of all, she was going to be the new girl in school, and everybody knew what Kate’s done to the Hale Family after finding about Kate being her mother as well. Besides, her grandpa took over the principle’s job, torturing him to make him quit which was, fortunately, stayed as a secret but the old principle was back. But even above that, she always hated being the new girl in school. That was the reason why she stopped traveling with her mother and decided to stay with her grandparents. It was okay until it wasn’t and she found her way back here again.

And third and worst of them was this: She feared the fact that hallucinations might come back. Those sons of bitches would scare the crap out of Stella, leaving her confused, empty and with the emotions that she hated feeling at all. But still it was also one of the reasons why she was back in here in the first place, to figure out what were they all about.

Oh and, also, there was this reality called high school. Okay, Stella was a smart girl and she was a straight-A student and her grades were pretty amazing but who in their right mind would love school at the age of 17 anyway, right?

She snapped out of her thoughts when she heard her cousin’s loud voice and then her repeated knocking on her room’s door. “Stella, aren’t you ready yet?!” Allison has been telling her to hurry up for a while now or they would be late for school. Young girl rolled her eyes and threw her head back, silently screamed in annoyance and frustration. She wasn’t ready for junior year; she wasn’t ready for a school day. The only thing that pushed Stella to be ready was the idea of finding herself a distraction. Another knock on the door distracted Stella the way she wasn’t planning in her head. She sighed unpleased as she heard Allison’s voice again. “Stella! We gotta go, c’mon!” Stella checked herself on the mirror. She had a black mini dress and a denim jacket with high heel boots. Her long, brown hair was released down on her right shoulder, reaching to her belly.

She took another breath as she grabbed her bag and walked towards to the door. “God, Allison” she said, closing the door behind her and then continued as they started walking towards to elevator to get down to the garage. “School is not going anywhere, and you need to relax.”

They were living in an apartment now because after what happened to Victoria, they sold the old house and went to France for the summer. Chris originally planned to live there, away from supernatural and everything else, but Stella and Allison managed to convince Chris to go back in return of promising not to hunt anymore. They bought an apartment near the school in downtown and now it was their new home.

As they stepped into the elevator and pushed the button and watched doors slide closed, Allison rolled her eyes but couldn’t help the soft smile on her face. She was so happy that Stella agreed to come to Beacon Hills with her, with them. After Chris told Allison about the things that happened to Stella, she knew it was very hard on her to be back, even though Stella wasn’t too obvious about it to anyone else.

Allison couldn’t even dream of being strong the way she was.

But selfishly, she felt happy. It really meant a lot for Stella to come here with her. She couldn’t afford to lose another family member after her mother dying and her grandfather going all psycho on them. Stella and Chris were what she had left, and she wanted them close and safe at all times.

“We have to get my friend Lydia on our way” Allison informed her when they reached to her car, opening the door to driver’s seat. Stella shrugged as she sat right next to Allison on the passenger seat of the car. Stella had a car on her own but since they were all going to the school, there was no point of them driving separately. “Her car is broken, you know, a deer hit her car…” Allison frowned with the thoughts as she continued. “… which was pretty weird, to be honest.” Stella nodded as she knew what happened few days ago. She knew how a deer ran to Lydia’s car, broke the windshield and definitely broke the engine and then one of their friends had to give them a ride to their individual houses. 

“Your car, your friends Ally” Stella responded as she shrugged and watched her cousin sit on her seat and put her seatbelt on. “Do what you want to do.” She exhaled and out of the corner of her brown eyes, she looked at her cousin as she continued. “I don’t know if she would like me though.”

Allison frowned, looking at her cousin, curiously. She knew how much Stella hated being the new girl, but she also knew what she was usually like. She knew Stella was pretty popular and all back in her old school in New York and she was pretty amazing. “I’m sure you are gonna make friends on your first day” she softly said, trying to comfort her cousin. “I was new and I was able to have friend.” She had a soft and sincere smile on her face. She really believed this school was going to be good for Stella. 

“Allison, that’s because you are you” Stella said laughing silently and nervously. “You are more likeable.” Allison could see how anxious she was just the way she was playing with her fingers and looking outside the window.

She put her hand on her cousin’s shoulder give support, her other hand was on the steering wheel, driving the car. “Well, you still have me” she joked, getting a soft chuckle out of her. She took a right turn as she smiled. Lydia’s house was so close to them, they were almost there. Her hand tightly kept holding her shoulder as she continued. “Besides, my friends will love you, trust me.”

Stella smiled as Allison stopped the car in front of Lydia’s house. Stella opened her door to get out of it. “Whatever you say Ally.” As she climbed out of the car, Allison had a soft smile on her face. She followed Stella outside, watching Lydia walking towards them with a big smile. She looked beautiful as always. 

Stella looked away when she saw both girls hugging each other. Her right foot was tapping the floor with a rhythm and when she heard her own name from Allison’s mouth, she looked up to the girls. “Lydia, this is Stella” she introduced them. Allison was sure Lydia would love her but somehow Stella’s anxiety was contagious.

Lydia eyed her for a split second before putting back her own signature smile on her face. She pointed Stella’s whole outfit before she started talking. “I love your style and you being Allison’s cousin automatically makes you my close friend.” Stella couldn’t help her smile as Lydia reached for the backseat but then with her hand on the door, she looked back at her. “Besides, he mentioned how much you helped him, so… Thank you.”

Stella’s smile got deeper thinking about the mentioned him. She knew it was Jackson. She felt proud for the first time in a while that she had something in saving him.

Stella’s first thought when they arrived at school was to get rid of the things that she was carrying between her hands. She definitely hated carrying stuff. She would usually have her gun and china daggers on her, aside from the school supplies and they were heavy anyway but since she was in school, she knew that she couldn’t bring them here. Well, not again at least… or not all of them. So, she didn’t have her gun with her.

They walked to their assigned lockers. Stella was thrilled to finally stand in front of it and even more when she realized her locker was right next to Allison’s. “Apparently, there is no escape from me, Argent” Stella marked playfully as she put everything back to her locker besides her phone. She thought about her first class as she decorated the inside of her locker while Allison was looking at hers as well and finally Lydia found them after visiting her own locker which was a little far away from both Argents. Probably due to her last name being Martin…

Stella closed her locker as she and Lydia leaned against the blue lockers and watched the hallway, scanned the new faces.

Yes, she definitely needed some sort of distraction. 

“Freshmen” Lydia said, swinging her finger side to side with the melody of her voice. “Tons of and tons of freshmen!” Stella smiled at Lydia, looking down but looking back up at the hallways as she listened her cousin and apparently her new friend. They had a great chance to chat on their way to School and Stella definitely loved her but after that comment, she found herself liking Lydia even more because she felt like they were pretty much alike about this whole boyfriend thing. Of course, she wasn’t going to do what she planned to with a freshman since she was a junior but there were new students for each year. There was going to be someone.

There had to be.

Hearing what Lydia said and her cousin smiling at it agreeing her, Allison looked at their direction with an amazed face. “You mean fresh boys” Allison said as she put the pink notebook back to her locker. She chuckled and grabbed her blue notebook from her bag. “Lydia, they are fourteen.”

“Eh, some are more mature than others” Lydia said, waved her hand in the hair in a way that says it wasn’t that important.

Stella nodded, crossing her arms in front of her chest but still looking at the hallway. “I agree with Lydia” she said, looking at the students. Some of them were looking at their direction, checking them out who were usually juniors or seniors and some of them were looking down at the map trying to figure out the school who were freshmen and new to the school. And Stella could hear that there were three types of conversation going on through the hallways: a) How hot and sexy the new girl was and b) how the new girl’s mother was a murderer and grandpa was a psychopath… She rolled her eyes, not caring about any of it and looked at her cousin as she shrugged. “And I’ve actually witnessed it.”

Allison looked at them again. “You know, it’s okay to be single” she started. Her brown eyes were on Stella and Lydia, making it seem like she was talking to them about them but both knew she was talking about herself to them because she was having second thoughts about her breakup with Scott after seeing him the night of the deer crash. “Focus on yourself for a little while, work on becoming a better person.” As she looked back at her locker by the time she was finished talking, Stella had an Oh-My-God expression and Lydia was looking at Allison lovingly but with an I-am-not-stupid kind of smile.

“Allison, I love you” Stella said. Even though she meant the ‘I love you’ part, she was actually being sarcastic at the same time. “So, if you need to do that thing where you talk about us and pretend like we’re not actually talking about you, it’s totally fine.” Allison smiled, not knowing what to say or do as she looked at the ground only to look back at her cousin after a while. She knew she was doing the thing Stella said. “I don’t know about Lydia, but I don’t want a boyfriend.” She placed her hand on the locker, turned to hallway to look at the people as he sucked a breath in between her teeth. “I want a distraction.” She looked at Allison, moving her eyebrows with a smile. “You know, it was my only condition while agreeing to come here so if all of those weird stuff is not gonna go away, I am gonna need someone to distract me from them.”

“I agree with Stella” Lydia said as she tilted her head and smiled. Everything that happened last year… She really felt the same way as Stella. “I want nothing serious. All I want is…” Stella burst into laughter at Lydia’s unfinished sentence, agreeing with her making Allison to look at them in disbelief but with a ghost of a smile. She couldn’t help but think how much she loved them.

And then _they_ entered the school. Stella saw them when she was about to look at her cousin but ended up looking at the entrance of the school instead at the sight of them. They were both pulling off the leather jacket perfectly. One of them had a cocky smirk. They both had helmets between their hands which caught Stella’s attention even more because she liked driving but she loved motorcycles more but all those weapons on the back of the trunk was the reason why Stella never got herself a bike in the first place.

Her eyes kept moving on them because other than the helmets and the fact that they were riding bikes… they were hot as hell.

“Brothers?” Allison asked curiously, not seeing the smirk on Stella’s face.

“Better” Stella replied, her smirk got deeper. As Allison looked at her, she amusingly moved her shoulders. “Twins.” Lydia pushed the girl on her shoulder making her to laugh as three of them started to walk to their first class of the day which was English.

Lydia and Stella found two empty seats right away which were two seats away from each other. Lydia took one, Stella took the other. As the younger Argent put her notebook on the desk, she looked around. She didn’t know what to expect, it wasn’t like she was going to talk to anyone or any plans to do so.

Well, other than one of those two twin gods.

She laughed to herself but immediately stopped when she felt like someone was looking at her. She turned around and came across with two big hazel eyes who was looking at her like he was trying to remember something. He seemed to be forcing his brain further to find the memory that he was looking for. Stella instantly realized who he was and he was none other than Stiles, the guy that awkwardly called for Allison last year. As Stella remembered that day, he wasn’t that lucky and when Lydia who he had a crush on since third grade sat next to him, he stopped thinking about the new girl and looked at the Martin girl.

Meanwhile Allison walked in right after Stella and Lydia, looked around to see any empty seats. But the only seat that was empty was right in front of the one that Scott was sitting on. She kept looking around to see if she had more choice but then with a soft sigh, she settled with her faith and walked up to him with very slow steps. “Is someone-”

Before Allison could finish her question in a soft and innocent way, Scott shook his head nervously. “No, no, no, no, no. No, it’s all yours, all yours. Uh, it’s totally vacant” Scott said awkwardly and in an obvious way that showed how nervous and excited he was to see her.

Allison tried to hide her smile biting her lip as she took a seat. Meanwhile Stiles who was watching the whole thing, gave Scott a thumbs up. Stella meant to chuckle at how nervous Scott was but startled when her phone vibrated suddenly on the desk. She looked at her screen, seeing the new text message. She started reading it, frowning with confusion without even noticing everyone else was doing the exact same thing.

Then she heard a woman’s voice followed by the sound of her high heels meeting the floor with every step. “The offing was barred by a black bank of clouds and the tranquil waterway…” There was a brunette woman standing in front of the class with her cream-colored high heels, dark colored skirt and beige colored shirt who was obviously the new teacher. “… Leading to the uttermost ends of the earth flowed somber under an overcast sky, seemed to lead into the heart of an immense darkness.” She smiled, looking at the students in front of her. “This is the last line to the first book we are going to read. It is also the last text you will receive in this class.” She held the phone in the air to make her point in the conversation. “Phones off, everyone.” Stella bit the inside of her cheek as she grabbed her phone but instead of turning it off, she put the phone down on the screen.

Ms. Blake smiled and grabbed a pen, thinking every phone was off now and looked at the black board before she started writing. Stella grabbed her own pen but instead of writing the things on the board or listening to the class, she started drawing. Not that she was good at it _that_ much, but she loved it and she was already bored. She drew few trees that looked exactly the same and some circles, keeping her gaze on the paper.

Stella licked her lips as she started thinking, taking a deep breath in. The drawing reminded her the four groups of word that she wrote last year which were one of the reasons she came back. She had to go and talk to Peter hale when she could. She was thinking that he might know things that Stella was interested in knowing. Maybe she could go after school or she had a free period and she could go then but she had to do it alone. No one should have found out about this.

But she still had to figure out where was he staying or where he was in the first place. Stella’s best guess was where Derek was staying at the moment but she wasn’t really sure yet. 

Stella looked up when she heard a voice. She watched someone come into class and whispered something into the teacher’s ear. He left the class, followed by Ms. Blake and Scott who also took his belongings. Stella, seeing the opportunity, she grabbed her stuff and sat on Scott’s seat with a little bit of noise, making Allison and few others to chuckle.

Ms. Blake came in few seconds later and noticed the difference instantly. “Ms. Argent” she said, making Stella to look at her. Everyone knew she was talking about the younger one. “Based on my visual memory, I am pretty sure you were sitting right in front of me. I’m going to ask you to come back to your seat, please.” She could see the reason why Stella changed her seat; she was sitting right behind her cousin.

“Based on my own memory, I am pretty sure I won’t be going back to my seat, Ms. Blake” she said sarcastically. Even though Allison was smiling, she couldn’t help but felt anxious towards this encounter between her cousin and the teacher, but she also knew it wasn’t really her first time doing something like that. She was the reckless and, Allison was the cautious one.

“Are you going to talk?” she asked.

Stella thought to herself. “Probably” she answered. As the class giggled, Ms. Blake kept her gaze on the young Argent. The only reason why Stella was so casual about this was the fact that she knew Ms. Blake was new and honestly, she had nothing over Stella.

“I can’t do anything to get you back to your old seat?” she asked, causing Stella to shrug and smile with a message of no. It was Ms. Blake’s first day as a teacher so, she was pretty nervous. She tried to come up with a way. “Bribe you?”

“Couldn’t meet my price and you wouldn’t do it” she answered, smiling, not caring about anything.

“Give you low performance grade?” Ms. Blake pushed. Everyone was either giggling at this encounter or, biting their lips not to giggle or trying to look away and most of them were failing at everything.

“Even if you do, I won’t be failing. I am smart enough to keep my midterms and finals above A” she said with a sweet smile and right when the teacher opened her mouth, Stella continued. “And even if you prepared the hardest exam of your lifetime, while everyone fails, I get a B. Sorry, B+ which also is a passing grade.”

Ms. Blake knew that. She went through every student’s school records from previous classes and perhaps previous schools.

“Change your final grade?” she asked, knowing she couldn’t do it.

Stella laughed. “Then you and I have a chat in the principle’s office that will end up with you getting fired” she said, keeping the smile on.

Ms. Blake nodded, admitting the defeat. “Eyes on the board, everyone.” Stella smiled with the victory as she went back to her drawings.

Allison leaned back to her with a smile. “Take it easy, tiger” she said slowly as a whisper.

Stella’s smile turned into a grin. “Where’s the fun in that?” she said, making Allison to chuckle as she turned back to the board.

“Hey, Lydia” Stiles called Lydia’s name as he knotted when Stella went back to her drawings. Since Stiles was sitting right next to Stella now, she could hear their conversation even though she didn’t mean to. Lydia looked at Stiles curiously. “What is that? Is that from the accident?” Young girl looked at the bruise on her leg with reflex while Stiles was pointing the ground with his pen.

“No” Lydia said with a weird and awkward voice tone. “Prada bit me.”

“Your dog?” Stiles asked, making Lydia to roll her green eyes. 

“No, my designer handbag” she answered sarcastically. “Yes, my dog.”

She went back to writing but Stiles wasn’t just giving up yet. “Has it ever bitten you before?” he asked, making Stella to fight her urge to roll her eyes at his obsessiveness. Lydia shook her head, mumbling in a broken voice and giving Stiles the answer. “Okay.” He took a breath and looked back at Lydia. “What if it’s, like, the same thing as the deer?” Lydia frowned, looking at Stiles. “You know, like, how animals start acting weird right before an earthquake or something?”

Young girl tilted her head and smiled sarcastically. “Meaning what? There is gonna be an earthquake?”

“Or something” Stiles responded. “I just maybe, it means something’s coming. Something bad.”

“It was a deer and a dog. What’s the thing you say about threes?” Lydia asked.

“Once an accident, twice a coincidence and third is a motive” Stella whispered, making Stiles to look at her but right when Lydia opened her mouth to tell them there was probably nothing to worry about, everyone startled with the sound of something hitting the window and when they turned their heads to look at it, there was a big blood stain on it. Allison turned on her desk and immediately held Stella’s hand anxiously.

Right now, she was happy that Stella was right behind her.

Ms. Blake put the board marker on to the table and started walking towards the glass. With the thing she saw, she couldn’t help but gasp. Lots of birds, almost thousands of birds were flying towards them without any of them turning to any sides or stopping whatsoever.

Then they started hitting the glass. Stella knew the glass wouldn’t hold them for so long, squeezed her cousin’s hand.

And in that moment, one bird broke the glass and fly inside.

As the birds flied their way into the classroom, all the windows were shattered into pieces falling down onto the floor.

While Stiles immediately swiping his desk away from him to cover Lydia so that she wouldn’t get hurt, Allison’s first instinct was to protect her cousin. Both crouched down, covering their heads as they held onto each other, both wanting to protect one another.

“Get down, everyone!” Stella heard Ms. Blake at the same time she felt a scratch on her arm that hurt like a bitch but was too shocked to think about it. “Get down! Get down! Get down!”

When everything was over, Stella’s hair was a mess and her heart was pounding like everybody else in the class. She stood up slowly, looking around. Desks were all over the place, everyone was clearly in shock. Allison was holding her head, Stella looked at her arm. There were few scratches that weren’t that deep but it sure as hell hurt. 

Stiles and Lydia walked up to the Argent girls. Stiles may not have known Stella that much, at all, but he was friends with Allison, and he knew Stella was her cousin. He put one hand on her elbow to gain their attention and as Stella looked at him, still shaken up by the whole thing, Stiles’ hand was gone.

“You girls okay?” he asked, worrying about them. Stella kept looking at them while Allison confirmed him that they were okay with a nod. Stella crossed her arms in front of her chest, finally nodding at him as well.

“Stiles, this… This is my cousin Stella that I told you guys about” Allison said, feeling the need to stop in the mid-sentence to clear her throat. She turned to her cousin. “Stella, this is Stiles Stilinski.” She knew it wasn’t exactly a proper time to introduce them to each other, knowing both of their personalities and the thing that just happened few minutes ago. But as she could hear Ms. Blake calling the police with a terrified voice and the other students calling their parents, she felt like she needed to say something before she reached for her phone to call her father and create a silence that could be awkward. 

“Yes, the other Argent” Stiles murmured, remembering what they talked about on their way to the girls’ houses on the night of the deer accident.

Stella rolled her eyes, looking at Stiles. “You seriously gonna call me that? Again? She literally told you my name not two seconds ago.” Stiles frowned, looking at her. Stella understood that he didn’t remember the night we meant by his reaction to the word ‘again’ and let out a small laughter. “You are not very good with first impressions, Stilinski.”

“Who let you call me Stilinski?” Stella saw him getting annoyed which made her feel satisfied. She laughed as Allison and Lydia were looking at them like they were watching a tennis tournament. Allison knew her cousin’s behavior in situations like that, so she wasn’t really surprised but Lydia looked like she was enjoying what was happening. It pretty much helped with tension of the bird situation earlier.

“I did, Stilinski” said she, sitting back on her desk and reaching for the phone to call her uncle. Meanwhile Stiles was looking at her, annoyed. Stella didn’t really care. She hated people calling her the other Argent so if Stiles gets to call her then, then she gets to call her Stilinski. 

“They seem to get along just fine, right?” Lydia asked with a sarcastic smile looking at Allison. She looked like she wasn’t shock anymore while talking but her messy hair and her eyes just stated different but to be honest, none of them were okay. 

Stiles was standing on the other side of the class with his phone, telling Scott what just happened. The police were here and so was their uncle Chris. He was checking on Allison and Stella’s wounds.

“Next time you’re feeling you wanna stay home, you girls stay home” said he, looking at the two girls in front of him.

As he let go of Stella’s arm after checking her wounds, she shrugged. “I wanted to stay home; Allison dragged me.” As she blamed her, Allison just rolled her eyes but said nothing. She just looked up at her father and told him that they were fine but then licked her lips and straightened up.

“But, dad, the deer and now this?” Chris sighed at Allison’s question. He knew something was up. He knew none of them could be a big coincidence. He still didn’t know what was happening to Stella. His brain was thinking about a lot of things at the same time so he couldn’t see any reasonable explanation for anything that’s been going on.

Then the Sheriff walked up to them.

“Mr. Argent, you wouldn’t have any insight into this, would you?” he asked curiously, making Argents to look at him worried and confused. Did he know about the supernatural world? What was he talking about? Sheriff felt the need to explain himself. “I’m sorry.” He pointed his son with his thumb who was still texting Scott. “I-I could’ve sworn I overheard my son talking about how you were an experienced hunter.”

Chris took a deep breath and smiled softly at the sheriff. “Well, not anymore” he said while Stiles was looking at their direction with wide open eyes, making Stella to mouth at him saying good job Stilinski without anyone noticing.

The sheriff nodded and before he left them alone, he looked at the girls. “You girls are okay?” he asked, making Stella and Allison to nod. Sheriff gave them a small smile. He remembered Stella from her time here and besides he knew about her record.

It wasn’t that bright.

After their confirmation, Sheriff turned around to walk up to her son who was looking at him his hands wide open and asking him what the hell he was doing with an expression on his face.

“Is it me or is Beacon Hills turning into more like a beacon for the totally bizarre and supernatural?” Lydia asked fixing her makeup on the mirror that she put inside of her locker. Allison laughed while Stella smiled softly as she looked at the beautiful girl.

“Actually, it has always been that way” she said, leaning against the locker right next to Lydia’s. “Hence the name.” Allison and Lydia giggled softly. Stella smiled as she brushed her hair back and pushed herself off the locker. “Anyway, I gotta go to the bathroom. Wait for me for few minutes?”

As Allison and Lydia nodded, confirming her, Stella started walking to the WC and reached out for her phone to text Isaac.

**Stella – I am back to Beacon Hills, Lahey. I am gonna need someone to help me catch up. Can you save some time for your favorite hunter?**

She sent her text, did what she was supposed to in the WC, washed her hands and walked out as she brushed her back again. It was still messy after the bird attack but not the way it was few seconds after.

As she took a left at the end of the hallway, she stopped bumping into someone. She looked up to see who it was, only to see it was one of the twins. The twin was smiling at her and God, she could do lots of things right now, like get his number or maybe even go back to the bathroom but she had to go since her cousin was waiting and she was in a hurry and honestly, her uncle was in the school.

“Sorry” she said, meaning to walk past him but he just kept smirking.

“I’m Aiden” he said as his twin kept walking away to give them space. Stella softly smiled and looked at him, but she was still walking backwards.

“And I’m leaving.” As she turned back with a smile, Aiden watched her walk away from him with a smirk and thought about how he loved a challenge.

Stella stopped walking when she was right next to Allison who was talking to Lydia with a confused face. She frowned when she noticed the bruises on their arms but couldn’t ask anything when they hid it because they heard Chris.

“Come on, let’s get you three girls out of here. School can wait another day.” Stella was so happy to hear that. As Lydia and she walked pass her uncle, Allison stopped with a thought to talk with her father.

Stella found the opportunity to look at the strawberry blonde girl right next to her. “Okay, I’m pretty sure I was gone for 2-4 minutes tops and I didn’t even talk to him that much which was a complete loss, by the way.” Lydia laughed as Stella continued. “What happened while I was gone? What are these bruises?”

Lydia told her what happened. She mentioned how some girl was looking for Scott and squeezed their wrists so bad that she left these marks but when she felt her uncle’s hand on her waist, guiding them to the exit, they stopped talking.

No one talked as they walked out of the school campus.

When they arrived at home, three of them went to Allison’s room. Since Stella was done with her room, Allison still needed help with it such as which color she was gonna use for the walls.

That’s why as they talked about which color it should be, Lydia was thinking about pink while Allison thought about blue, Stella was careless about colors. She was laying down on Allison’s bed, thinking about the bruises and marks on their wrists.

As she noticed something, she jumped in the bed and sat down. She was really bothered ever since she saw them and couldn’t help but think how both of them looked like a symbol or something when they were right next to each other.

Because the symbol that two bruises looked together was familiar to the young Argent.

“Okay, not to alarm you or scare you or anything but when you put those together… They look like they mean something.” Allison and Lydia looked at Allison when she started talking, frowning. Stella shrugged and put her hands in the air with the meaning of ‘I am just saying’ while she was sitting on the bed, making both of them to look at their wrists.

The first one to agree with Stella was Allison. “Maybe we have something to figure out” she murmured. She remembered how hurried she was, how terrified she was. Stella kept looking at her cousin and Allison knew exactly what she was supposed to so. She reached for her phone fast as she looked at her cousin and friend who were looking at her worried. “I have to call Scott.”


	2. CHAOS RISING

After finding out where Scott was, three girls jumped in the car and headed to their destination. On the road, Lydia and Allison went on the marks with a pen that would wash off. Stella was sitting in the backseat, looking at them as she leaned into the between of the driver and passenger seats.

She couldn’t help but think how much she hated the backseat.

“I don’t know” Lydia said, looking at the two bruises. “It doesn’t look like much to me.”

“It’s a pattern” Allison said, insisting as she got her arm off Lydia’s grip. Her cousin was never in situations like that. She trusted him. Besides, she could see it as well and thinking about that girl’s attitude, it totally meant something. “It means something.” It had to mean something.

“Okay but you really think Scott’s gonna know what it is?” Lydia asked, looking at Allison. Stella was in the backseat, not talking and as she licked her chopped lips, she bit the inside of her cheek like she would usually do when she was nervous.

“No, but he might know someone who does” Allison said, taking a deep breath in. She was checking out her cousin from the rear-view time to time but decided not to say anything about her anxiety.

“How are you both so sure that it means something at all?” Lydia asked, frowning.

As Allison grimaced anxiously, Stella answered their friend. “Because a nut-job who looks like they ran out of hospital, according to your description, doesn’t look for someone just for the fun of it” Stella said, then put her hands up. “Of course, I’m telling all this based on the story you told me.”

“Yes” said Allison, confirming her cousin. “Because that girl wasn’t just looking for Scott. It’s like she needed to find him. Like she had to. That means something.”

As Allison drove faster, Stella and Lydia sighed and shared a concerned look. 

When Scott got out of the house, Stella was closing her door. She walked with fast steps towards Lydia and watched the dramatic moment between her cousin and the wolf boy.

“This isn’t the talk we are gonna have, is it?” Scott asked softly with a little bit of disappointment that Stella choose to ignore as Allison shook her head and before she showed him her wrist, she sighed.

“I have to show you something.” As Scott looked at the bruise, Stella moved on her spot nervously. There was something bothering her, but she didn’t know what. Her anxiety was getting wild with every second and when she was nervous, she would move a lot and wouldn’t stop.

She started to walk to the house, making Lydia to look at her and put her hand on her shoulder. Stella didn’t say anything but put up her forefinger to say that she’ll be back in a minute.

The house was full of high school, even college students. Everyone was drinking, dancing. The music was pretty loud.

Stella didn’t see any familiar faces.

Young Argent headed towards the staircase which was going to lead her to the basement. There were glass shattering voices in the back of her brain, making her frown. With each step, the voices got deeper and louder and sharper which only made her startle with every step.

She walked downstairs slowly only to notice there were broken wine glasses at the bottom of the stairs.

She frowned, kept on walking. The glasses were making a crackling voice under her shoes.

Then she saw the rest of it. Her hand covered her mouth not to scream as she took a step back. Every bottle was on the floor, broken. But that wasn’t the reason of Stella’s fear. There was blood on the broken glass pieces and on the floor.

Unlike her fast heartbeats, she walked backwards slowly. Closed her brown eyes and took deep breathes. No, no, no… She opened her eyes back only to freak out more.

There was now nothing. No broken glasses, no blood, no mess… A big fat nothing… Stella gulped, her heart got faster and then her steps caught up with her heart’s speed and walked upstairs rapidly. The first thing she hoped to find was the booze table.

_Bingo._

She got herself a red cup and filled it with vodka until the red cup was full. Her heart was crazy, her breathings were irregular and sharp. She needed to take a moment.

So, she drank the whole vodka in a second, put the glass back on the table and sat on the staircase which was right next to the drink table. This one was leading to the second floor of the house.

She placed her elbow on her legs as she put her head between her arms. Her fingers were in her hair, making it a little bit messier.

“Stella?” She looked up as she felt someone touching her shoulder. Stiles was standing in front of her but when he saw her expression on her face, he frowned as he sat right next to her on the stairs, concerned about the young girl. “Hey, you okay?” Even though they’ve just met and Stella kept calling her Stilinski, seeing her like that made him worried about her.

“What are you doing here Stilinski?” Stella asked, ignoring Stiles’ question. She didn’t need anyone to ask her if she was okay. She was okay, it was just…

No. No, she wasn’t okay. She was freaking out. She didn’t know how she just had to go to the basement, but she was sure something happened in there. There were broken glasses and then there weren’t any broken glasses. The bruise on her cousin’s arm seemed so familiar but she didn’t know where was it from. Her brain was about to shut everything off due to multiple errors, but she wasn’t going to let anyone know about anything.

“Apparently, I’m just trying to help you while you are being mean to me” Stiles sarcastically said. Stella could sense a little bit anger in his voice but also knew it wasn’t for her. She didn’t know who he was angry at or frustrated with, but he also looked like he could use some distraction.

Stella playfully rolled her eyes and smiled softly. She got up and without giving him a time to talk, she reached for Stiles’ hand and got him up as well. He immediately sent her a look asking her what she was doing. “Well, I’m bored, and I need a distraction” she responded to his expression and when an evil plan formed in her head, she smirked slowly. “Wanna have sex?” And when Stiles gulped as it’s being his reaction, Stella laughed at him amusingly. “I’m just messing with you, Stilinski. Pull yourself together.” She stopped laughing and pressed her lips together to hold her laughter. “I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.” She let go of his hand and smiled sincerely. “I don’t know what happened to you, but I think we both deserved to have some fun, what do you say?” She stopped and then added. “And by fun, I mean dance.”

Stiles was suspicious as they walked among the dancing bodies, wondering what made Stella go from shaken up to this aliveness. Stella noticed that too, so she sighed and looked at his caramel eyes. “If you stop looking at me like that and help me distract myself, I’ll forget the first day we met, Stilinski.”

Stiles kept looking at her confused. First day they met? As Stella started moving to the music, she laughed. Another sarcastic one but different from others, this was actually sincere, sounded… happy.

“You called me the other Argent when I came here for a visit, a year back” Stella reminded. Stiles still looked lost, but he started to dance like Stella. He was horrible at it and Stella found herself chuckling softly. “Don’t you remember? Wow, okay, uhh… Well, how about this? I need to see Allison right away? Party night at Lydia’s house?”

Stiles frowned with memory flying back to his mind. “Yeah, I’m sorry about that” he murmured. Stella shrugged, meaning that it’s okay. At least, for the time being, she didn’t really care. She didn’t care about her low self-esteem. All she cared about this weird, psychic abilities that she had. More importantly, she cared about finding out what the hell they were and what the hell they meant. She snapped away from her thoughts when she noticed the soft smile on Stiles’ face as he looked at her. “You are gonna keep calling me Stilinski, aren’t you?”

Stella smiled. “Yes, Stilinski” she said. “I will definitely keep calling you Stilinski.”

On the next school day, Derek got dragged down to school by Scott. They got into an empty classroom to talk about what happened to Lydia and Allison yesterday, thinking maybe it could help them find his lost puppies in his pack. Stiles, Scott and Derek were already there when the girls walked in. Derek looked at Stella that lasted less than a second. Stella knew it was his way of welcoming her back so as she smiled softly and nodded at him, he was back to being his sour self.

She sat on a desk and put her feet on the chair, meanwhile Derek started to look at the bruises on Allison and Lydia’s wrists after Scott told him the whole story.

“I don’t see anything” he said, speaking emotionlessly. Scott looked at Derek, telling him to look again as Stella just put her elbows on her legs and placed her head on her hands, still looking at the scene in front of her. “How is a bruise gonna tell me where Erica and Boyd are?” His voice was louder than before and a little bit sarcastic as well.

“It’s the same on both sides, exactly the same!” Scott said, trying to make Derek believe him. But Derek only believed what he has seen and only that. He wouldn’t believe when someone would tell him something. Stella figured that out last year while she was staying with him.

And Derek saying “It’s nothing” was the proof of that.

“Pareidolia” Lydia said, leaning towards to her knees as she placed her elbows on her legs and crossed her hands together. She was also one of the few people who thought it didn’t mean anything. “Seeing patterns that aren’t there.”

Derek and Scott kept looking at her and then each other with confusion, making Lydia to roll her eyes and shook her head in disbelief while Stella parted her lips to explain for them. “It’s a subset of apophenia” she said. As Stella murmured and shrugged while saying, she saw Lydia’s soft smile out of the corner of her eyes and with a smile of her own, she turned her head to look at Lydia who was looking at her proudly. With her purple dress and strawberry blonde hair, she looked really beautiful, Stella couldn’t help but think. 

“They’re just trying to help” Scott said, trying to ignore how smart those two girls were. He could never compete, so he tried to focus on the problem that was in front of them.

“These two?” Derek said, pointing Allison and Lydia with his head. He scoffed, considering everything that’s been happened and looked at the two girls. As he pointed Lydia first, he opened his mouth. “This one, who used me to resurrect my psychotic uncle. Thank you.” Lydia grimaced while Derek turned to Allison because now it was her turn. “And this one, who shot about 30 arrows into me and my pack.”

As Allison acted like none of them really mattered to her, Stella heard Stilinski talking right next to her. He was sitting like Stella; his shoes were on the chair. “Okay, all right, now, come on” he started in an attempt of easing the tension. “No one died, all right? Look, there may have been a little maiming, okay, a little mangling, but no death. That’s what I call an important distinction.”

As Derek decided to send him his famous death glares, Allison knotted and opened her mouth. “My mom died” she said, making Stella to look on her hands as she pressed her lips together.

“Your family’s little honor code killed her” Derek said, calmly but in a scary deadly way. He shook his head. “Not me.”

Stella felt like she needed to interrupt. “That girl was looking for Scott, Derek” she said, taking a deep breath. She was sad when she heard the news about her aunt Victoria and she knew everything, at least what Allison told her. She couldn’t bring herself to ask Derek, mostly she was scared of the answer but right now they needed to get out of that topic.

“Yeah, and I’m here to help him, not you.” Allison shook her head, exhausted.

Derek walked up to the door. “If you wanna help, find something real” he said harshly. As he turned back and reached for the door, Scott stopped him. As they both started to talk about things that Stella couldn’t really hear about, Allison rolled her eyes.

Stella smoothly moved her eyebrows as she started speaking. “Well” she said softly, looking at her cousin. “He definitely has a master’s degree at being a sour wolf.”

As Stiles approved the young girl, Derek and Scott finished their little argument and Derek left them alone but after that, they all went their different classes due to the bell ringing. They had plenty of time to talk about everything during school hours and after anyway.

When Stella found Stiles and Scott on the school yard few classes after the little pack meeting, they were talking about something. Young Argent walked up to them, fixing her hair which was a complete mess at the moment. “Hey, what are you guys talking about?” Stella asked, finally catching up with them.

Stiles welcomed her with a smile but then frowned. “Why are you such a mess?” he asked, confused. Stella frowned back with an even more confused face, asking what he was talking about. “I don’t know. I mean your hair, your…” He stopped, thinking about a possibility that confirmed by Stella’s expression. His mouth opened and then closed back and then opened back again. “You know what? Never mind.” He looked at Scott who looked like he was thinking about something else. Stiles hit him in the arm to gain his attention on him. “Okay, back to the topic, what would a pack of alphas want with Erica and Boyd?” he asked, trying to get the image of Stella having ‘fun’ with someone in the school out of his head. Not like he had a thing for her or anything. No. He had to admit, they’ve just met but after the night of Heather ditching him, they were friends and Stiles enjoyed her company. He wasn’t going to lie.

But picturing that stuff was… for some reason… uncomfortable.

“I’m not sure it’s them they want” Scott said, starting to walk faster. This year was gonna be better for his education and he didn’t want to be late for Economics. Especially when it was Coach’s class.

“Okay, what, like Derek? Like they’re recruiting?” Stiles asked, making Stella to frown as she kept walking with them since she had the same class as them.

“You know what? You might have a point on that. I mean, they are alphas and they are a pack, right? Derek is one too and…” Stella stopped talking when she saw Scott spaced out while Stiles confirmed her and then looked at Scott.

“Scott. Hey, Scotty.” Scott got himself together and then looked at his friends. He first looked at Stiles who was his best friend and then looked at Stella who was new to their ‘pack’, but she was someone that Scott cared about deeply. She was a lot like Allison, but he knew he would never look at Stella that way. 

As three of them kept walking to class, Stella fixed her hair, Stiles tried to erase the image, Scott just laughed it off and thanked for this light moment ahead of the whole chaos that they could only guess that was coming.

Coach dropped the yellow book on the desk hard as he looked at the class and the students. “The stock market is based on two principles” he said, walked in front of the desk, opened his hands to both sides as he waited for an answer to the question he was about to ask. “What are they?” He kept looking at the class. Stella, knowing the answer, didn’t even bother. She was just tapping her pen to the side of the notebook to the rhythm and thinking. Meanwhile Scott raised his hand. Coach nodded. “Yes, McCall, you can go to the bathroom” he said, making Scott to drop his hand in embarrassment before he started talking.

“Uh, no, Coach, I know the answer” he said, making Coach to burst into laughter. As Stella tried to hide her giggle behind her hands which was due to Coach’s reaction, he kept on laughing but when he saw how serious Scott was, he stopped.

“Oh, you’re serious” Coach said, amazed.

Scott nodded. “Yes” he said and then added. “Risk and reward.”

Coach laughed. “Wow! Who are you?” he questioned, walking towards Scott’s desk. “Who are you and what have you done to McCall?” Scott smiled as Coach kept talking. “Don’t answer that. I like you better.” He put his hands on Scott’s desk and leaned onto it. “I liked you better.” He straightened up and he walked up to his table. “Does anybody have a quarter? A quarter?” Stiles immediately reached out to his pocket but when he meant to pull out a quarter, something came out with it. Stella saw some folio flying and flipping around to finally drop on the floor. As she noticed what it was, she let out a small ‘oh my God’ out of her mouth as she grinned. The condom folio made the whole classroom to laugh as Coach reached out to it without knowing what to say. Stiles was obviously wishing he would just disappear in that moment. Meanwhile Coach gave the folio back to Stiles. “Stilinski, I think you, uh, you dropped this” he said and as he took the quarter, he smirked. “And congratulations.” Everyone giggled as Coach got back the subject. “Risk and reward. Put the quarter in the mug, win the reward.” He took the mug from the desk and placed it on the floor, stepped back and flipped the quarter in the perfect angle only to watch it fall into the mug. Everyone clapped, he straightened his back and flipped the quarter to Danny. “Okay, Danny. Risk, reward.”

Danny looked at the quarter between his fingers and then looked back at Coach. “What’s the reward?” he asked curiously.

“You don’t have the pop quiz tomorrow” Coach answered, opening his hands to both sides. Stella looked up with the word ‘quiz’ and raised her eyebrows.

“Coach” she interrupted as she moved on her spot. “Don’t mean to, you know, interrupt your job or anything but if you tell us it’s a pop quiz, it’s not a pop quiz.”

Coach looked at Stella who was sitting in the back of the classroom, next to Stiles, in disappointment but then Danny supported Stella. “Actually, she is right Coach” he said, making Stella to smile at him. Coach reached out for the quarter between Danny’s hands and pointed him and Stella with his index finger.

“Danny and Stella, I really expect more from both of you at this point” he said.

“Coach, I’m a new student” Stella informed him as she smiled. “You don’t know me.”

“I don’t care” Finstock responded, causing Stella to grin and shrug. Coach turned to look at Scott after their encounter with the new Argent. “McCall” he yelled it out. When he put the quarter on the desk, Scott’s eyes followed the small object. “Risk or reward?” Scott’s hand found the quarter. “The risk: if you don’t put that quarter in the mug, you have to take the pop…” Coach stopped and as he corrected himself, he looked annoyed. Stella grinned more. “The quiz. You have to take the quiz and you have to write an essay. Risk, more work. Reward, no work at all. Or Choose not to play.” As Coach has been telling all that to Scott, Stella couldn’t help but roll her eyes. Scott’s been thinking too much and taking too much time to decide.

Take the quarter or don’t take the quarter. It was that simple.

“Ah, come on McCall!” Stella said, making heads to turn to her. She was frustrated, she hated waiting for something that wasn’t that important to be waiting for. “Take the damn quarter or don’t. Don’t make easy things that hard.”

Scott took a deep breath and put the quarter back to his desk, making Coach to nod. “No play, okay.” Coach took the quarter and looked at Stella. “Stella, what do you say?”

Stella laughed sarcastically as she raised her eyebrows. “I think I’ll pass” she said, making Coach to shrug and ask who was willing to play. As an answer, Stiles beat the desk like it was a drum and got on his feet. He took the quarter of off Coach’s hands and prepared himself to make the shot.

That’s when Sheriff walked in. “Stiles.”

“Okay, Coach, I got it” Stiles said, not realizing it was his dad speaking. Stella stopped playing with her fingers as she rolled her eyes, hearing Sheriff call out for his son again. This time, Stiles looked up to the door, saw his father and with the confirmation of Coach, he followed him outside.

Stella immediately looked to her left, to Scott and parted her lips. “Hey, Wolfy” she said, trying to get his attention on her. When he looked at Stella, she showed her ear to make her point. “Listen.” Scott nodded, confirming her as he focused on the hearing. He listened while telling Stella what was happening. As the conversation went on, Stella felt more terrified with each second. Sheriff was mentioning a missing person who was last seen by Stiles. Stella licked her lips with anxiety. “Where… Where did you see them go that night?” Stella murmured to Scott.

“To the basement” he answered, not knowing what was happening. “Why?” As Stella murmured him there wasn’t a reason of why she was asking such question, she remembered the basement. How there was horrible scene before but then it wasn’t.

“No reason” she whispered, holding onto her pants to stop the shaking of her hands. The class was almost over, she could wait. She pushed down the scream and as she tried to ignore the glares of Scott who was very worried about her, she focused on Coach. 

After Economics, Stiles and Scott went to their next class. Meanwhile Stella, Lydia and Allison had a free period, so she met them at the library. She was feeling a lot better, her hands weren’t shaking or there wasn’t any urge to scream whatsoever.

When Stella took a seat right next to Lydia, she saw that Allison was drawing the shape of the bruise that she was obviously very obsessed with, Lydia took a sip from her cup. They said their hellos while Lydia was scanning the library with her green eyes.

That’s when the twins walked in, making every girl and some guys to look at them.

Stella smiled, rolling her eyes as she reached for coffee that Allison got for her. She needed the caffeine.

Then she heard a voice that said “I want one” very softly. It was Lydia, checking out the twins. Allison turned back to see who she was talking about and looked back to her friend with a huge smile. Stella leaned back, watching both of them talk.

“Which one?” she asked. Lydia giggled sarcastically. One of the twins were eye-flirting with Danny and he was obviously playing in the other lane.

“The straight one, obviously” Lydia answered. Allison turned back again to see what her friend was talking about. Lydia took another sip as Stella smiled and shrugged.

“Sorry Lyds, can’t have the other one either” she said, still smiling as she took another sip from her coffee. Lydia was definitely confused but as both of the girls looked at the twins, it was obvious that the straight one who was standing in front of one of the bookcases was looking at Stella and smirking.

Allison looked back at Stella so fast that Stella couldn’t help her laughter. 

“I am officially a proud friend” Lydia claimed, making Allison to grimace and Stella to chuckle. Lydia turned on her chair to look at Stella better. “Since when?”

Stella shrugged. “Since this morning” she answered with a smirk.

“Oh God, Stella” Allison murmured. She put the cup between her hands on the desk. She wanted her cousin to be happy and obviously they’d talk about this stuff, but the way Stella’s smiling…

Stella laughed again. “What?” she asked, leaning back and crossing her arms in front of her chest. “What’s wrong? We have talked about these things before. You know about my sex life. What’s wrong now?”

Allison let out a giggle. “We are in school” she said. “And your smirk doesn’t give great signals.”

“Not the weirdest place I had sex in” she answered before getting off her chair, seeing Allison grimace and walk to Aiden.

“Hey” Aiden said, seeing Stella walking towards him. Stella smiled softly as he reached up to him and leaned to the bookcase. “Are we going to Coach’s office?”

Stella let out a soft chuckle. “Weren’t we just there this morning, Aiden?” she asked with the softest and maybe playful voice. “Besides Coach is there right now. He is planning and making preparations for the Lacrosse practice.” Aiden frowned, asking Stella how she knows that only to see her shrug. Then she pull out her phone and looked at Coach’s plan that she stole this morning when they were in his office. “But two hours later, his office and also the locker rooms are empty as they can be.”

“I’ll see you in math, then” Aiden said, thinking about his schedule. He had his bad boy smirk on.

“See you in Biology.” Stella put and tapped on his chest as she smiled and went back to their table only to see her cousin was still looking at her amazingly.

Allison shook her head. “Stella, you can’t ditch biology” she said, making Stella to look back at her who was watching Lydia exchanging her number with some guy few tables away. As Stella smiled softly at her new friend and then focused on her best friend.

“Actually, I can” Stella said as Lydia left the guy and started to walk back to their table. Allison frowned at her cousin, making her to smile more and shrug one shoulder. “Because you’ll be there to cover for me.” As Allison remembered they were taking biology together, Lydia sat back on the chair and Stella kept looking at her cousin with the cutest smile.

It was almost 8 pm when Stella arrived at the vet clinic after receiving a text message from Scott. The werewolf asked her to come, knowing the things happened last year. He knew Stella was smart, a genius level of smart and they needed her help to find Boyd and Erica.

Besides, if they haven’t called her, she would kick their asses.

When Stella walked inside, she heard Derek’s voice first. “Then we get them out tonight” he said, making Stella to knot in confusion. Scott only mentioned some in his text, just enough to make her understand the context.

“You have to be smart about this Derek” Stella said, making everyone know she was there. As she shared a small nod with Isaac as a welcome, Deaton and Derek looked at her. She opened her mouth again. “You can’t just storming in.”

As Deaton nodded, agreeing with her; Stiles frowned, he looked like he was thinking about something. “If Isaac got in, so can we.” Derek was tough and determined. Stella knew he just wanted to redeem himself for the things he has done as an alpha and she understood him. He had mistakes like every single one of them.

“But he didn’t get through a vault door, did he?” Deaton asked with a little bit of sarcasm that was totally for Derek.

“We need a plan” Stella insisted. She was thinking that this was the reason why she was here. Apparently, Erica was dead, but Boyd wasn’t alone in the vault and Stella was supposed to help them save those two werewolves. “A perfect plan…” She sighed as she crossed her arms in front of her chest the way Derek was doing and leaned back the wall behind her. “Derek, I know you. You are trying to learn a lot from one clue and it’s not possible if you are not me. Just because of that, you were gonna get some innocent girl killed last year.” As Scott, Stiles, Isaac and Deaton listened to the young Argent, Deaton was the only one who raised his eyebrows at the fact that Stella was here last year. Stiles obviously found out from Scott after he told him, he texted Stella to come here. “We need to sit down, relax and make a plan.”

“How are we gonna come up with a plan to break into a bank vault in less than 24 hours” Derek asked, he uncrossed his arms and put his one hand in his front pocket. Stella bit her upper lip. Yes, she was arrested for breaking into someone’s house but never planned anything like breaking into bank or rob a bank whatsoever. Besides, The Argents were one of the richest families in the States. She didn’t necessarily need to rob a bank.

She shrugged. “It shouldn’t be that hard, right?”

“Uh, I think someone already did.” Stella looked at Stiles, hearing his voice. Meanwhile young man who found an article on his phone started to read it out loud to the five person that was listening to him. “Beacon Hills first national closes its doors three months after vault robbery.” After reading the tittle, he looked up as he swung his hand in the air. “Doesn’t say here how it was robbed, but it won’t take long to find out.” Stiles remembered why Stella came here in the first place, so he smirked and looked at Stella who was thinking about something else but as she heard Stiles’ voice, she looked up at him. “Maybe we should ask the ex-convict?”

Stella rolled her eyes. She knew Allison told everyone why she came here last year, when she was actually supposed to move in with the Argents. But here was the thing, no one knew why she actually did that. Stella didn’t regret anything. She would’ve done it again.

Stella looked at Stiles. “Shut it, Stilinski” she said. Her voice wasn’t loud, but it was sharp and harsh enough. Stiles focused on the matter in their hands with a grin.

“How long would it take?” Derek asked, trying to change the subject. His expression was as always, tough.

“It’s the internet, Derek” Stiles said, leaning towards the desk. “Minutes.”

Stella let out a sarcastic laugh between her lips. “I am sure, Stilinski” she remarked. “Minutes.”

“I am assuming you have a question” Deaton said with a soft smile. After seeing everybody except for Stella left the clinic, he knew something was up. Stella sighed as she told everything that’s been bothering her for the last two years. She talked about the voices and the hallucinations and the screams. She knew Deaton had knowledge about all of it so she thought he may be able to help her out.

“I’ve searched in every kind of book while I was in France” Stella continued after telling Deaton about her nightmares of a hallucinations. Deaton frowned, listening to the girl. He was thinking. He had an opinion, but he wasn’t sure. “Zero. Nothing. France is where it all began. Hometown of the supernatural. At least for the werewolves but there should have been something about this too, right?” Stella shook her head. “But there are no records whatsoever. The hallucinations, voices… I am losing my mind here.”

“To be honest Stella…” Deaton took a deep breath and shook his head to both sides. “I have no idea what your problem is.” Stella bit her inner cheek as the vet continued. “But I can look it up. You not finding it in French records doesn’t mean it never happened to anyone before. Probably I can find someone who knows about something.” Stella nodded as Deaton gave her a sincere smile. “I’ll keep in touch.”

She startled when her naked back met the cold surface of the grey locker, making Aiden to apart their lips and look at her. “You alright?” he asked curiously, panting. They have been using the locker room and Coach’s office or anywhere empty almost every day ever since they have met. It was the best time of the day for the two of them, but Stella really needed it right now. She was almost late to her first class this morning after convincing Allison to let her sleep more, Allison was being totally suspicious about something that Stella had intentions to find out and they still had to save Boyd and some other werewolf tonight. Stella was going to follow her cousin, so she texted Scott that she wasn’t coming to the bank.

She was thinking a lot. That’s why she found Aiden before her last class for the day.

Stella answered Aiden’s question with a nod and decided to use the energy to put her lips back to his, instead of speaking. Her legs were around Aiden’s torso and his hands were carrying her, placed on her thighs hardly and he was enjoying this way more than he should.

As his lips found their way to Stella’s neck; she leaned her head back, hitting the locker, making her neck more reachable to Aiden’s lips. Her hands went through his messy hair. They were both in their underwears and Stella could hear voices behind the door, but it was all so blur to her. All she knew was she was enjoying this, but they had to hurry. 

“So, are you free tonight?” Aiden asked, wearing his pants back. Stella pressed her lips together as she fixed her bra and bent down to get her t-shirt. After their encounter, she had to take a minute to think about what she was supposed to do. She was going to follow her cousin who was being weird all day.

“No, I’ve got a thing” she said, not giving any specific information. Stella licked her lips and smiled as she looked at Aiden. “See you tomorrow?”

Aiden smirked. “You know where to find me” he said, making Stella to grin. She put her hand on his chest and raised up on her tiptoes to place a kiss on his lips before she left him in the locker room alone.

“Oh my God” Stella said, getting out of her car with a grin. Allison was looking busted as Stella walked up to her. She witnessed her weird actions all day as she was trying to avoid her. That’s why instead of being with Derek and his ‘super’ team and make a plan, she followed her cousin to the Beacon Hills First National Bank with a tool to break the chain in front of the door. “Allison Argent, caught while trying to rob a bank.” She crossed her arms in front of her chest as she pointed the bank sarcastically. “Well, this bank’s already been robbed and apparently closed.” Allison kept looking at her cousin with a guilty look. “Also, the last time I’ve checked, The Argents were pretty rich.”

Allison looked like she couldn’t find any words to say. “Stella…” she mumbled but Stella interrupted. 

“You seriously thought you could hide something from me Ally? After learning about everything, this was supposed to just… I don’t know, fly away, that I wouldn’t find out about it?” She kept walking towards her cousin. “We promised each other Allison. No more lies.” She took a deep breath. “You don’t need to tell me why you’re here because I obviously know and besides, we don’t really have the time, but we are in this together. So…” She pointed the door with her head. “Break away.”

Allison looked at her cousin for a while but then smiled and nodded.

Two girls started walking in the halls of the empty bank. “I’m sorry” Allison murmured after putting the red tool on the floor and looking at her cousin. Stella shook her head, telling her to let it go. She kept walking by Allison’s side as she was looking at the dusty halls.

This place hasn’t been used for years, apparently.

As they kept walking Stella thought about their agreement not to lie to each other. Yes, they promised each other, and Stella gave a beautiful speech just few minutes ago but she was also the one who hasn’t told her about what happened few days ago, the things she saw and heard in the basement of that girl who was still missing. There were two reasons why she hasn’t mentioned it to her yet. One, she didn’t want her cousin to be worried about her and two, she wanted to wait and see what was going to happen.

She stopped, bumping to her cousin. Allison stopped walking, hearing a voice and looking around but when nothing came out, they kept walking.

Until someone pushed Allison to the wall, making Stella to step back quickly due to her reflexes.

When Allison was pinned against the wall, she took a better look at who came out from the shadows. “Ms. Morell?” Allison yelled out in shock.

Stella frowned alongside her fast heart beats, finally seeing who it was. “What- Guidance counsellors are also in the supernatural world now?” Stella asked but before she could talk too much or Allison could ask another question Morell opened her mouth, shutting both girls up.

“Keep your mouths shut, and listen close” she ordered, looking at the two girls in the eye and letting Allison go. “You have no idea what you girls just stepped into. Right now, you’ve got maybe 20 seconds to get your asses hidden.” Allison asked what she was doing with a shaky voice, but Morell didn’t answer. She continued, ignoring her question. “Get in that storage closet over there. Lock the door. When you hear the fighting start, that’s when you come out.”

Allison quickly grabbed her cousin’s hand and did as she was told.

As Allison stopped moving, leaning against the door, Stella’s eyes looked around the dusky room. She tried to open the lights but failed.

Footsteps have been heard by the two girls. As Stella poured some of the chemical matter to the floor, in front of the door to cover their scent, Allison took out her jacket and put it on the floor. Stella reached for her phone, opened her lantern and took a look around the room but if she could think, she wouldn’t do that.

As the light found Erica’s rotten corpse, she held herself not to scream. Allison put her hand on her mouth to prevent any noice that she could make in fear as she took a step back. Stella handed her phone to her cousin to wipe her shaky hands on her jeans. She was inhaling and exhaling to calm down. There were voices in the back of her brain. They were telling different names at the same time. No, they weren’t telling. They were screaming.

Allison gulped but then saw her cousin’s face and looked at her worriedly, focusing on her more instead of Erica. “It’s happening again, isn’t it?” she murmured, asking but already knowing the answer. Her voice was still shaky but she was feeling a lot more controlled than Stella. Allison saw her little, innocent nod. “We are gonna figure this out. You’re gonna be okay. We’ll talk about this, okay? But right now, we have to get out of here.”

Stella nodded again, pushing the urge to scream back.

Stella was the first one to hear the noises. She reached out to door handle with the need to get out of there. It was same with Allison as well.

They ran together to the sources of the voice. The voices were coming from the inside of the vault. It was _the_ vault. The vault that Isaac told them about. And inside, Boyd, Derek, Scott and some girl were fighting. Stella remembered the things they have talked about last night with Derek and the others. They have been here for more than 3 full Moon. They have been charged. They were stronger and angrier than ever.

“Look out!” Allison screamed as Boyd slammed Scott onto the floor. As Allison was watching the scene in front of her, Stella tried to come up with a plan. Every plan that she thought had a disadvantage but when Boyd’s claws were in Scott’s stomach, lifting him up, she bended down to do the only thing that made sense.

“No! Don’t break the seal!” Derek yelled, seeing what Stella was up to while still fighting with the girl. Stella knew he was right. Letting them go in the wild with that rage and uncontrolled could be very dangerous but then she looked at Scott again. Over the summer he kept texting Stella to ask about Allison and her. After a while, the Allison related messages stopped but Scott kept talking with Stella to ask how she was doing and what was she doing.

Scott was like a brother for Stella. They’ve known each other for almost a year but the conversations they had together… Stella never thought she would have something like that in her whole life and now that she has found it, she wasn’t going to lose it.

Stella looked at Allison who was still watching Scott. She thought about her cousin and Scott but that was it. “Boyd!” she yelled out as she broke the mountain ash seal.

Boyd let go off Scott, ran past the Argent girls and the other girl followed him. The minute they ran off, Derek came out angrily. He held Stella’s arm so strong, so tight that Stella could feel the pain and tightened her muscles in reflex, in attempt of easing the pain.

Scott ran after him. “Don’t touch her!” he screamed. Stella thought she didn’t need his protection. Yeah, the grip was hurting her but her face hardened, not showing any kind of emotion. Her defense mechanism was on.

“What were you thinking?” he asked angrily, shaking her. At the end of his sentence, he pushed her slowly but very strongly. Stella didn’t know what Derek was thinking. Did she hurt his trust or was it something else? All she knew that she has saved his sorry ass.

“That I had to do something!” Stella yelled with a harsh tone. This conversation felt so unnecessary. They should have been out there looking for the two killing machines.

“She saved our lives!” Scott said, looking at Derek. Allison was standing right next to her cousin, being very protective over her.

“Yeah, and what do you think they’re gonna do out there?” Derek kept yelling as he asked. “Do you have any idea what we just set free?”

Before Stella got any chance to explain herself, Allison took a step forward. “You want to blame her?” Allison screamed angrily. Derek has been bugging her ever since they came back to Beacon Hills and it was her breaking point. “She is not the one turning teenagers into killers!”

“No. No, that’s just the rest of your family.” Derek pointed at Stella with his head, making her to straightened up with reflex and let go of the arm she’s been holding ever since Derek pushed her. “Do you really think they’ve been teaching your cousin how to use arrows and bows and guns since she was 8 years old to spend some quality time with the family? I don’t think so.”

Derek’s angry eyes were locked on Allison who stopped, licked her lips in frustration. “I made mistakes, but Gerard is not my fault” she said. Allison’s voice was rough and shaky. Stella knew what happened last year. She knew how Gerard tricked Allison to hunt with him after Victoria passed away. She’s been feeling the guilt ever since, and Derek was too angry not to care about anything and just threw it at her face.

“And what about your mother?” He questioned. He wasn’t screaming anymore. Allison frowned, not knowing what he was talking about. Derek looked at Scott. “Tell her Scott. Tell them.”

“What does he mean Scott?” Allison asked. Her voice was behind exhausted. As she kept looking at Scott, waiting for an answer; Stella startled, hearing a scream in the back of her head. She tried to hold it in. She really did. But failed as her heart got faster as she took a step back and opened her mouth to scream. Before she closed her eyes, she saw Scott and Derek closing their ears with their hands.

When the scream was over, she opened her eyes back to see everyone looking at her in shock. She pressed her shaky lips together to stop the shaking and looked at her cousin who was looking at her back with a worried face.

Allison meant to hold her shoulder, but Stella took a step back so that Allison wouldn’t touch her. “I’m… I’m okay” she murmured with the lowest voice. “I just… I just have to go. I’m sorry.”

And then before any of them could do anything, she turned back and found herself running to her car, hearing them calling out for her. She sat on the driver seat, started the engine and drove away.


	3. FIREFLIES

Stella didn’t go home.

It was her plan at first when she got into her car maybe but the more time she spent on her own, she changed her mind. She had to find the werewolves and fixed the problem herself created. She had to find Boyd and the girl. She thought about where they might be and all of a sudden, she heard a scream in the back of head. It wasn’t like before. It wasn’t loud and it didn’t sound… different.

This one belonged to a terrified child.

She mouthed a silent curse, leaving the confused mood behind and as she focused on the situation in her hands, she felt more controlled. She didn’t know where the voice came from, but she kept driving until she knew she had to stop.

She stopped the car in the middle of the woods once again. Reached to her trunk, got her lightsaber. When she heard something again, she closed the trunk really fast and ran towards the voice.

There was broken wood underneath her shoes, cracking as she kept walking on them. She stopped, feeling that material. When she looked up, she saw Boyd. There were some crazy fireflies, flying around him, making him annoyed. As he was trying to get them to get away from him, Stella saw two children running away. She let out a calm breath, but she also knew it was matter of time before he realized that.

Then he looked around, found out about his targets were gone. Stella knew right now that he wasn’t thinking straight, and she didn’t want to hurt him, but she also knew if it came to that, she would hurt him.

Boyd roared, looking at the moon.

She lost Boyd at some point because there was another scream in the back of her head and even though she didn’t want to admit it because it’d make the situation a lot weirder than it already was, Stella knew whose scream was it. She kept hearing Lydia in her head and when she was caught off guard again and through the anxiety she was feeling time to time, she’d scream.

She had to find out what was happening in order to maintain the last bit of sanity she had left.

She ran until she saw Allison’s car, she looked everywhere for Boyd but because of her emotional state, she failed, and she blamed herself for it like the way she was doing ever since she ran away last year. Normally, she was a perfect tracker. She was so perfect at it that she could find someone without even a proper clue.

But ever since that scream, ever since that first hallucination, she couldn’t get her straight together. She hated it.

And seeing her cousin’s black car was the finish line for the young Argent.

Allison was sitting in her car, looking at her arrow and thinking about how her mother actually died. She didn’t notice Stella until she ran towards her and knocked on the window of the driver seat where Allison was sitting.

Stela watched Allison turn to look at her and her face to fill with concern and anxiety again. She stepped back as Allison got out of her car and right before she opened her mouth to say something, Stella acted quick and shut her up before she could find a chance to ask her about the scream.

“I know, okay, I know I have a lot to tell you about, but I lost Boyd and I saw how eager he was to kill two children” she said, feeling the anxiety rising inside her. “I swear to God, I will explain everything but right now we have to stop Boyd and whoever that girl is Ally.”

Allison looked at her cousin for a while, knowing that she was right and then she nodded, confirming her and two Argents got packed up and then ran into the woods.

When she found the other instead of Boyd, she saw that the angry werewolf threw Isaac to a tree. Allison and she were split up a while ago to cover more grounds and now Stella was all alone and had no idea what to do. She didn’t want to see one of her close friends get beaten up, but they were moving so close and so fast that if she used the lightsaber, it could hit Isaac.

And then someone, Derek, jumped over Isaac and tried to fight the angry one.

Stella got out of the bushes to help Isaac out.

“You okay?” she asked, worried. Isaac nodded, confirming her but then telling her to stay behind as she rolled her eyes and watched those five werewolves growl at each other. It was Scott, Derek, Isaac, Boyd, and that werewolf that she still had no idea who she was.

Suddenly, Boyd and the girl ran the other direction, leaving them in shock without giving them a chance to do anything else. Isaac and Derek were the first people to snap out of it run after them. Right when Scott was about to go after them, he stopped sensing someone’s presence and probably their fear.

Stella looked at the frightened girl who was wearing a white shirt covered with dirt from the trees.

Scott’s body switched into a position that says he wasn’t going to hurt her. “Are you okay?” asked, worried. “Are you alright?” Young girl stepped back with a confused and spaced out face. It was obvious that this night wasn’t going the way it was planned for her.

Well, she wasn’t alone.

Stella walked up to Scott and looked at the young girl. “You need to get out of here, okay? Get out of the woods!” Stella said with hurry, standing right next to him. She pointed the exit of the woods as she kept talking. “Get out of here as fast as you can!” And then without saying anything, she and Scott ran the way Derek and Isaac left them. Scott was pacing his speed to Stella, but he was still faster than her, he wanted to catch up with them.

And when they caught up, Stella saw that Derek and Isaac was standing alone, apparently lost those two werewolves.

“Are you being real?” Stella yelled out as she brushed her hair back. “You really lost those two?”

Derek looked at the young Argent angrily and sarcastically. “Look who’s talking!”

“Yeah, Derek” she talked back. “Yes. I’m a human. You’re an alpha werewolf. Let’s compare those two, shall we?” Derek didn’t know what to say. Stella was looking around, thinking about what they were going to do. As she heard Scott’s phone ring, it was Stiles who was calling, she looked back at Derek. “Who was the other one?”

“My sister Cora” Derek explained as Scott took the call and started talking to Stiles. Stella raised her eyebrows in shock but didn’t say anything as she just decided to listen Scott. By the time, Scott was asking Stiles if he was sure. Stella didn’t know what they were talking about, but she heard little words like dead and body.

“Can you get a little closer to make sure it was them?” asked Scott. He sounded like he didn’t want to believe it was them. Stella bit her lip. She wondered where her cousin was, and what she was doing. She was almost sure that Allison was having more fun and probably helping more than Stella. “… Please just do it.”

“This doesn’t make any sense” Derek said, listening on their conversation. “The public pool is all the way on the other side of the woods. We haven’t tracked them anywhere near there.” Scott told Derek that they killed someone. His voice was pretty high for him. Stella was listening to the conversations calmly, trying to find something to do but a part of her already knew what they were supposed to do. She didn’t really notice what she was doing but Stella was kind of avoiding diving back to supernatural world cannonball style. “How are they moving so fast?”

“Derek” Scott said.

“But they can’t be that fast on foot.”

“They killed someone” Scott repeated. He looked at Derek and continued. “Some totally innocent kid is dead and it’s our fault.”

Derek shook his head. “It’s my fault.”

“We need help” Scott said.

“We have Isaac now” Derek answered, refusing to look at or take help from Stella. It was obvious, he was still angry at her which only made Stella to roll her eyes. But in some ways… She really didn’t have the enough reason to blame him. She would do it again what she did if she had the chance but of course she’d prefer a way without resulting in someone’s dying.

“I mean real help” Scott said with determination. Isaac looked at Scott, offended while Scott was looking at Stella. They were both on the same page. They knew exactly who was needed at this point. “They are too fast for us, for all of us. They are too strong, too rabid.”

“We’ll catch them” Derek said, not even believing himself.

“What happens if we do?” Isaac asked, frowning, and looking at his alpha. “We just gonna hold them down until the sun comes up?”

“Maybe it would be just easier to kill them” Derek said but Stella knew even he didn’t like this option. One of them was his beta and the other was his sister that all these years he thought she was dead.

“Killing them isn’t the right thing to do” Stella said, looking at Derek. “Even you don’t like the option. We can find something else.”

“What if it’s the only thing to do?” Isaac asked, looking at the young Argent this time. “If we can’t even catch them, what else do we do?”

Scott shrugged. “Find someone who knows what they are doing” he said, looking at Derek and Isaac.

“Who?” Derek asked but he already knew the answer.

“Someone who knows how to hunt werewolves” Scott replied.

“Stella can help us” Isaac said, knowing who Scott was talking about.

Stella licked her lips. “I don’t have enough tools to take them down” she replied to her friend. She crossed her arms in front of her chest. She shrugged, looking at the werewolves around her. “And you guys know what happened at the vault. I can’t do shit right now.”

Derek let out a breath while Scott looked at Stella. “Do you know where he is?” he asked in defeat.

Stella shrugged again. “He was supposed to do grocery shopping today.”

When Scott and Stella found Chris, he’s just gotten out of the grocery store and putting the bags to the backseat of his grey Toyota. Even though he was pretty occupied, he somehow felt their presence behind him, and he turned back and pointed his gun at Scott, making him startle and Stella chuckle.

“Uh, hi” Scott said, frightened. Stella was pressing her lips together not to laugh but opened them to talk.

“Didn’t we stop hunting?” Stella asked, smiling at her uncle. “Why are you still carrying your gun with you?”

Chris kept pointing his gun to Scott without saying anything. But his eyes were looking at his niece. “I can ask you the same thing.”

Stella shrugged. “I’m helping, not hunting” she said. “Otherwise, we would never come to you.”

Chris let out a deep breath. “What happened?” he asked.

Scott and Stella told him everything. Stella left out the parts that involved her cousin. She was in big trouble already, judging by the look on her uncle’s face. She didn’t have to drag Allison with her.

When they finished their story, Chris kept looking at their faces. When he started talking again, his voice was a little bit angrier. “First of all, why would I care about anyone related to Derek?” he asked but Stella felt something in his expression. It was still harsh and determined but something was off. Stella frowned by the thing she noticed but didn’t put much thought into it. “And second, I don’t know this Boyd kid. I don’t even know his last name.”

“Uh, well, Boyd is his last name” Stella said, after Chris finished talking. She shrugged and maybe she was forcing her luck, but she kept talking. “So, you, technically, know his last name.”

Chris looked at his niece, frowning. “What’s his first name?”

“Vernon” Stella replied.

“Eh, just curious” Scott said, smiling innocently and softly. “Is there a reason the gun is still pointed at me?”

Chris looked at Scott and then to his shoes and then back at him as he squeezed the handle a little bit more. “Well, there’s probably still some part of me that wants to shoot you” he answered.

Scott raised his eyebrows and nodded. “I get that.”

Chris let out a deep breath as he put the gun back and looked at the two teenagers in front of him. He was more focused on Scott than Stella. As he started talking, Stella pressed her lips together, knowing the reason why. “Scott, I watched my father brainwash my daughter, almost turn her into a killer. That world… Your world decimated mine. My wife, my sister, my father, my entire family…” He stopped and pointed Stella with his head who was standing right next to Scott. “Also, I know my niece taking the hit of her own from that world as well.” He looked at her, worried, raising his eyebrows. “It’s still happening, isn’t it? It didn’t stop. It happened in France. It kept happening here.” He looked at her, waiting for an answer. Stella felt uncomfortable, being the subject of the conversation but she nodded. There was probably only one person in this world that she couldn’t lie about this thing to and it was Chris who looked back at Scott and talked again. “See. Now tell me Scott. Why would I ever step foot in it again?”

“Because people are going to do die!” Stella said, not giving Scott a chance to speak up. She got her uncle, she understood him. Besides, he made them promise before they came back here. If they wanted to live in Beacon Hills, then they’d have to stay away from the supernatural. But Stella couldn’t do that. There were lots of reasons for it obviously but there was one solid reason. She didn’t want to watch people die that she could save. “Because we know, you know how to catch them without killing them.”

“I’m sorry. I can’t help you” Chris said and then looked at his niece. “And Stella, your actions doesn’t fulfill the promise you made. I don’t want to attend another funeral, you got it? It’s something neither I nor Allison want.”

Stella sighed. “Nothing is going to happen to me” she said confidently, determined yet frustrated for the lack of trust.

“I hope you are right, but I want you to remember the promise you gave me” Chris said and then reached for the door handle. “C’mon, we are going home.” Stella rolled her eyes but took a step forward; meanwhile Scott was looking around, not knowing what to do.

“Um… Do you think you could do me, like, one little, tiny favor?” Scott asked to make him stop. Stella figured out his plan, she knew exactly what he was going to do or think what was gonna happen. “Can you give me a lift?”

Chris stopped the car in front of the public pool. Stella knew Derek and Isaac followed them here. She still hadn’t heard from her cousin which made her worried, but she knew Allison was just fine. She could take care of herself.

Scott thanked him and reached for the handle to get out of the car but stopped when Chris stopped him by talking. “They did this?” he asked, seeing the view from the car where they’ve parked. There were ambulances and police cars and Chris could see what was happening. “Boyd and…”

“Cora” Scott continued.

“I’ll help you but…” Chris started and then turned around to look at Stella who was basically laying down in the back. When Chris looked at her, she put her feet on the ground and straightened her back. She knew what he was exactly going to say. She tilted her head down and sighed loudly. Then she looked back at her uncle and shook her head.

“I am not going home” Stella protested.

“Stella, you gave me a promise” her uncle reminder her one more time. Stella rolled her eyes and came a little closer to the gap between the passenger and driver seat, looking at her uncle. Scott felt uncomfortable being in the car while they are having the conversation but didn’t have the courage to get out of the car as well.

“I have been training since I was 8” Stella started, trying to control the anger inside her. “You didn’t explain this world to me, I figured all out on my own. I can take care of myself.”

Chris spoke as he shook his head to both sides. “Not today” he said.

Stella exhaled frustratedly and looked at her uncle with a stone-cold face. “You think this family can run away from its past, but you are wrong” she said before she moved over and reached for the handle to open the door. She shook her head and kept looking at her uncle. “Sooner or later, we are going back to what we actually are. Hunters. And there’s nothing you can do to change that.”

As Stella got out of the car and leaving Chris with thoughts in his head, she headed for the apartment.


	4. UNLEASHED

“So, how is that punishment of yours going?” Lydia asked with a soft smile when all three of them were in school, standing in front of the Argent girls’ blue lockers. They both had different classes for the first period but they were gonna head for the same direction so Lydia waited with them as they had to get their notebooks.

“I didn’t have any mental breakdowns, if that’s what you’re asking” Stella answered, making Allison and Lydia to burst into laughter. She shook her head and closed the locker. They still had around five minutes until their first classes. “Thank God for Aiden.”

“Yeah, please stop doing that” Allison reacted. Young girl had to cover for Stella when Aiden was coming to visit while Stella was grounded and there were few times that she almost got caught but thankfully, none of them did.

“Hey, I can’t leave the house if not for school because I covered for you” Stella reminded her. “Last year, I broke my car to cover for you and Scott.” Allison, knowing all of them, pressed her lips together. She didn’t have anything to argue back. “So, suck it up.” She shrugged. “Besides, he didn’t come over last night. Consider us even, Argent.”

“Well, how long till you’re actually free?” Lydia asked, smiling while looking at her friend.

“Today is the last day” she answered. She rested her back against the locker and as she tilted her head back and closed her eyes, she sighed. “I can’t believe I went with Scott and the pack of dumbasses that night. I didn’t think. I just wanted to help because I let them out and then I got grounded.” She looked at Allison and Lydia. “Am I too stupid?”

“Stella” Lydia said, putting her hand on her shoulder and squeezing it. She smiled softly. “You are the last person that someone can call stupid.” She stopped, frowning. “Well, after me of course.”

And then the school bell ring and three girls started walking together with laughter.

Stella was so happy to get out of chemistry class which was the fourth period of the day. She took and gave out a deep breath as she started walking to her locker with her head down, only to look up when she arrived at her locker to see Aiden was waiting for her. She fixed the books between her arms, she shook her head, smiling softly and then walked up to her locker and opened the door.

“I am assuming the reason why you left me waiting in the Coach’s office the last period was the reason that you found out the argument between me and Lahey” said young man. Stella laughed sarcastically, looking at Aiden who was laying against Allison’s locker while watching Stella.

“Argument?” Stella asked, raising her eyebrows. “As far as I’ve heard, you had to stop kicking his ass just because Scott got in the way and there was a dead body found in the woods.” Aiden laughed, not feeling the need to hide the fact that was what truly happened. He tilted his down slightly and as he looked somewhere behind her without making it too obvious, he put his hand on Stella’s waist.

Meanwhile, on the spot that Aiden was looking at, there was Isaac and Scott, having a conversation. No one noticed Aiden for a while as they kept talking about what happened in the woods with Coach and how angry Isaac was at the twins and how much he wanted to kill them.

“Don’t let it bother you. It’s just lunchtime detention” Scott said, opening his locker and placing his books and notebooks inside it. At the same time, he was looking at Isaac who wasn’t looking at him. He was trying to give him reasons not to fight with Ethan and Aiden. “If all they want right now is to piss you off, then don’t give in. They’re just trying to get to you.”

Isaac scoffed sarcastically, annoyed. “It’s not just me” he said, making Scott to look where Isaac was looking the whole time. Scott saw Stella and Aiden talking very comfortably around each other with Aiden’s hand is still on Stella’s waist.

He focused on his hearing.

“Would you want me to teach you how to fight?” Aiden asked with a cocky grin. He was well aware of the fact that Scott and Isaac were listening in on them. Stella obviously didn’t know about it due to being just human, she just smiled what Aiden offered to her. It was a sarcastic, yet soft smile. 

“I think I’ll pass” she said, closing and then resting her back on the blue lockers. She crossed her arms in front of her chest and then looked at Aiden. She didn’t want admit, or anything but she was enjoying Aiden’s company. That was definitely what kept her sane during her lockdown. His visits definitely helped her.

Aiden was good at being a distraction.

“Who else do you think is gonna offer that?” Aiden kept smirking. “It’s a dangerous world out there. I think you should know how to fight.”

“I know how to fight enough to kick your hot ass Aiden” Stella replied back with a smirk that was closer to his. “You don’t stand a chance against me.”

Aiden laughed softly, making Scott to get angrier each second that Aiden kept talking with Stella. “How about tomorrow?” Aiden asked. “Your punishment is over tonight, isn’t it?”

“I’ve got things” Stella said calmly but Aiden knew, judging by the tone of her voice that Stella was just having fun.

“How about tonight?” Aiden kept asking.

Stella licked her lips, grabbing her upper lip with her teeth and tried to hold her smile in. “As you know, I am grounded” she responded as she turned to her side and faced him. Her shoulder was touching the locker because she was leaning against it. That way she could see Aiden, widening his smile.

“That didn’t stop us before” Aiden said. “So, what do you say?”

“Nope, studying” Stella replied with a smile.

“I could help you” Aiden said, watching the girl in front of him.

Stella frowned. “Do you have an IQ higher than 170?” she questioned in disbelief.

Aiden laughed. “Okay, you could help me” he insisted.

“I thought you were gonna teach me how to fight” Stella said, placing her hand on Aiden’s muscled chest and raising her eyebrows, leaning towards him.

“I don’t see a reason why we shouldn’t do all” Aiden said and then added with a smirk. “Maybe even more.” Stella straightened her back with a smile that she couldn’t stop. That was enough for Aiden to get his answer. “Tonight, then.”

Stella smiled, tapped on Aiden’s chest and without realizing Scott and Isaac who were still listening in on them, walked on the opposite direction to find Lydia or Allison. As she disappeared walking, Aiden looked at Isaac and Scott with a smirk and then walked away.

Isaac turned to Scott who listened in every conversation they had with a smile that was closer to Aiden’s sarcastic one. Scott was pretty angry but that didn’t stop Isaac from talking. “Now they’re getting to you.”

“You know that there’s a temple in Calcuta where they used to sacrifice a child every day?” Stiles’ heated and anxious voice and conversation didn’t leave Stella and Lydia when they took a right turn to go and find somewhere to sit until their next class. When Stella found Lydia, Stiles was already presenting his theory of human sacrifices to Lydia and then went full on blather. Stella wished she’s found Allison instead of Lydia for a brief moment. She would be safe from Stiles’ maybe accurate but right now annoying theory time. But apparently, she fell asleep during French and had to go the lunch detention with her least favorite person: Isaac. Stiles snapped Stella out of her thought by keep on talking. “That’s every day a dead baby day, girls, every day!” He kept talking without taking a breath. “Hey, you want to know what today is? It’s dead baby day. Oh, no, wait, that’s every day because every day’s a dead baby day, yay!”

When Stella noticed he was blathering hard, she turned to look at Stiles without stopping to walk. “Why are you telling us this?” she asked, feeling exhausted by the things Stiles blathered about to them.

“Because Scott’s been dealing with the alpha twins” he responded, causing Stella to stop walking and look at him. She knew Stiles’ brain was about to explode but right now there was only one thing that interested Stella. Even though he was focused on his theory, Stiles noticed the confused expression on both of their faces. He stopped as well and placed his hands on his waist. “You don’t know about the twins?”

“Alphas?” said Lydia and Stella at the same time. Stella frowned still looking Stiles while Lydia raised her eyebrows.

“Ethan and Aiden?” Stiles confirmed with a question while he shared a look with Stella who seemed really shocked. Stiles could see she was thinking about something but then suddenly, she was back to normal. It didn’t take long for her to pull herself together. She nodded softly, making Stiles raise his eyebrows, questioning. Lydia was thinking about something else too, knowing about Stella and Aiden.

“Oh, yeah” Stella said as she started walking again. She couldn’t believe her the one who kept her sane during her lockdown was an alpha werewolf in an alpha pack that kidnapped Erica, Boyd and Cora and killed Erica. “Yeah, I know about them” she lied as Lydia joined her.

As they kept walking, Stiles continued again. “Okay, okay, good” he said as he started following the girls behind down the halls. “So look, here’s what I’m thinking. I’m thinking that the murders maybe come in threes. Ancient people love things in threes, right? So maybe first it’s three virgins, and then, I don’t know, it’s three people who own little dogs.”

“You are safe in both categories, why the anxiety Stilinski?” Stella asked with a smirk, making Stiles to look at her in disbelief, meanwhile Lydia was focused on something else.

“I own a little dog” Lydia said, stopping. But then she shook her finger, looking at Stiles and then kept walking. “I am not getting rid of my dog!”

“Would you just think about getting rid of your dog?” Stiles insisted.

“She is definitely not getting rid of her dog, Stilinski!” Stella said, rolling her eyes.

“Are you not hearing what I am saying? Even then, wouldn’t you think about getting rid of your dog?”

Lydia shook her head. “No” she said and continued. “And by the way, you cannot discern a pattern by a single data point, so stop trying.”

They walked into school again, Stiles was looking at Lydia in disbelief as he started talking. “What-okay, so what, I’m just supposed to wait around for someone else to die, then? I’m just supposed to sit there and watch them die? Just wait for them to wither up and die right in front of me?”

With Stiles’ use of description, all three of them stopped and the girls looked at Stiles with their confused expression. “Wither?” Lydia asked raising her eyebrows.

“You know what I mean” Stiles said, opening his arms to both sides. “Die, in just a hideously, awful, strangulating, head-bashing, throat-cutting kind of way.” His hands were moving as he talked, making Lydia to roll her eyes.

“Maybe it’s not your job.” As Lydia started speaking, Stiles frowned. He focused on Lydia as he started listening to her. “You said it yourself, they were strangled with a garrote. That’s a human thing to do, so… Maybe just leave the figuring it out part to someone human.”

“You mean someone like my dad?” Stiles asked. Stella pressed her lips together as she looked at Stiles. She knew he didn’t want to put his dad’s life in danger, but they were just teenagers and police’s job was to solve crimes.

“She means your dad, Stilinski” Stella said, sighing and then kept on walking with Lydia away from Stiles. “The Sheriff!”

With voices coming from the school’s hall, everyone was out to see what was happening. The minute Stella set foot on outside of class, she saw Aiden in front of his bike. She knew how that was looking but she saw the way Isaac was smiling and then he winked at her, she knew what was actually happening.

It was Isaac who was driving but to make him pissed the way he was doing to them, they came up with a plan like that to make it look like it was Aiden who was breaking the rules.

Stella knew more about the things between them now which led to her smile. Of course, she was going to side with her close friend instead of some alpha werewolf.

Didn’t matter how good at sex he was.

“You have got to be kidding me!” Ms. Blake walked past Stella to walk up to Aiden with an angry expression. “You realize this is gonna result in suspension.”

As Isaac, Scott and Allison kept laughing, it only made Aiden angrier.

After all of the chaos, it was Art class. Her eyes looked for Lydia, but she was nowhere to be seen and she realized she hasn’t seen her since lunch time.

She tried to focus on the canvas in front of her that was covered in blue paint. She didn’t know what to do with it because all of a sudden, something happened again. It was almost like there was a weird thriller music and a piano sound playing in the back of her head.

She looked around; the teacher was walking between the canvasses, looking at the things people have been doing, judging, praising… Stella took a deep breath, left the brush on the table right next to her and without caring the pain on her hands, she reached for her little purse, hung it on her shoulder and then started walking towards the exit.

Ms. Miller, seeing that, asked softly with curiosity and a little bit of sarcasm. “Are you going somewhere, Ms. Argent?” Stella looked at her, raising her eyebrows like it was so obvious. “Do you have a valid reason for it?”

The sarcasm and mocking in her expression got deeper. “Duh” she said and without saying anything else, she exited the class.

But when she stepped foot in the hallway, she saw something instead of school’s long hallway with walls covered with blue lockers. No. She was now standing in front of a gloomy hallway with the only light source was a white door that was few inches away from her. With reflex, she turned back but even the door she got out of wasn’t there now.

Young Argent looked forward with deep breathes and gulped. She closed and opened her eyes few times, only to see nothing was changed. She was hallucinating and she didn’t know how to get out. So, she did the only thing she thought she could do. She started walking to the only exit and the only light source that was the white door. As she reached for the handle, she couldn’t help but notice how her hands were shaking. She turned her shaky fingers into a fist to stop the shaking and then took a deep breath.

And then she heard the voice. “Stella!” She squeezed her fist, closed her eyes. “Stella!” She opened her eyes to look behind her but there was no one. Her heart got faster and her breathes got deeper as she tried to control the rising fear inside her. “Stella! Stella! Stella!” She closed her eyes shut. “STELLA!” When the voice screamed her name inside her brain, she screamed without being in control.

“Wow!” was the first thing she’s heard when she could focus around her again. She looked around. She was somewhere she hasn’t been before and there was someone pulling his hands from his ears. The guy had short brown hair and dark blue eyes. She insistently recognized who he was but she knew she’s never met him before. “Now that’s what I call a scream.” He had a smirk that only made Stella to punch him which was another clue on who he was.

She cleared her throat. Her heartbeats were back to normal and her hands weren’t shaking. “Peter Hale” she said as she went downstairs, walking into the loft, Peter’s smile got deeper and wider.

“In the flesh” he announced.

Stella pressed her lips against each other. She was feeling a lot better now. “Well, I’m glad” she said back, making Peter raise his eyebrows.

“You are the first and only person to say that” Peter said, getting off from the staircase he was standing on. He walked to the center of the loft.

Stella moved her eyebrows to Peter’s sentence and smiled a little bit. “I’m sure they have their own reasons, you know, like how you tried to kill them.” Stella laughed, putting her hands on the air. “I mean, I’m just guessing, obviously.”

As Peter smiled and frowned while looking at the young girl in front of him, Stella crossed her arms in front of her chest. Peter focused on her heartbeats, tried to understand her chemo signals. It was hard, considering he got back from the death but still managed to do so.

“You knew I was going to use Lydia to come back to life” he said all of a sudden and judging by the face of Stella, he was right. He frowned more. “How?”

Stella moved on her spot uncomfortably. Yes, she knew that. She figured out the meaning of the words that she wrote on the paper. She figured all out back in France that Lydia was going to bring Peter back from the death where he was buried in the Hale House during full Moon time. It was another reason to help Stella decide coming back here.

She had a lot of things to talk with Peter to.

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out” Stella answered, looking at Peter. “But before everything, there is something else I want to know.” Peter looked at her, waiting for her to continue. Stella took a deep breath and continued. “I want you to tell me everything about the Hale fire.”

Hearing that, Peter formed a smile on his face.


	5. FRAYED

“Stella!” Young Argent snapped out of her thoughts, hearing Lydia’s loud voice. She was sitting on the passenger seat, right next to Allison and there was Lydia who was sitting in the backseat who was playing with her hair out of boredom and looking at Stella with her green eyes. “You okay?” Lydia asked, knowing Stella’s been biting her inner cheek and looking outside nervously ever since they met up this morning. She was pretty distant and couldn’t seem to focus.

Meanwhile, during this road trip, Stella’s been thinking about the conversation she had with Peter Hale and the hallucination that led to it. She shouldn’t be trusting Peter but everything he told her made sense and sounded so realistic. Well, Peter level of sense and realistic but it was the most real information she got from someone in a long time.

Stella nodded, not to worry them more. “Yeah, yeah, I’m fine.” She saw Lydia rolling her eyes on the rear view, making Stella to turn to her back and look at her. “What? I am fine!”

“Ella” Lydia started talking, like she was telling something to a little girl. “Ever since we got in the car, you are biting your cheek and it makes me nervous.” She took a deep breath and looked at Argent who wasn’t driving the car. Allison was. “So, you better tell me what’s wrong before I punch you.”

Stella smiled. It was a sincere smile. Lately, so many things have been happening and it’s been a while she was smiling this honestly. “You wouldn’t punch me” Stella said, looking at Lydia, making her frown. “Because you love me.”

Lydia instantly started smiling and pointed her with her finger. “Yes, true, but I was serious about how you make me nervous” she responded.

“I’m sorry” she said sincerely. She shrugged and looked outside as she sighed. “I was just thinking about Derek.” She saw Lydia’s small nod and then as she put her hands on her knees, she looked at her cousin. “But you know, I am not the only nervous gal in this car, Lyds.”

“Am I getting too close?” Allison asked quickly, the minute Stella stopped talking. She wasn’t listening any of the things that happened few minutes ago. She was a lot more nervous than her cousin for several reasons. “I am getting too close, aren’t I?” Stella didn’t need to hear Allison’s voice to know she was nervous. Her body language was obvious enough.

“That depends” Lydia answered, playing with her hair. She let go of the piece between her fingers and then looked at the Argent who was driving the car. “Are you just following the bus…” She sucked breath between her teeth. “… Or are you planning on mounting at some point?”

“Yeah, I should back off” Allison said, leaning against the seat. This time, Stella looked at her and commented.

“Well, that also depends.” She had a curious expression on her face. “Do you mean the bus or the ex-boyfriend you are currently stalking?” As Stella put her elbow in front of the open window, Allison softly sighed and opened her mouth.

“Well, after everything that happened, I’m not letting him out of my sight” Allison said, making her cousin to frown and press her lips together as Lydia and she looked at her. “And by the way, this all started when he came knocking on my door. “

“For what?” Lydia asked curiously, making Stella to look at her cousin with raising her eyebrows and smiling meaningfully. Allison opened her lips, but nothing came out. Lydia, knowing she wasn’t going to learn anything from her, reached for her bag and took out a big orange book to read.

There was a silence in the car that only lead Stella to think how their big plan on taking down Deucalion back-fired. But then she sighed and looked at her cousin. She understood why she wanted to follow Scott. She really did.

And then she noticed something. “So, is this whole ‘not let them out of your sight’ thing literal or more like a general rule?” she asked, looking at the pointer that shows how much gas this car had. 

“Why?” Allison asked, lifting her head up.

“You’re running on fumes” Lydia said, knowing what Stella was talking about. Allison looked at the pointer quickly. As she let out a curse between her lips, Lydia nodded. “Yeah, and I’m pretty sure that bus holds a lot more gas than this Toyota.”

“What if we stop?” Allison said, slightly hitting the wheel and looking at Lydia through rear view mirror. Stella went through every possible outcomes, but they all ended up with them leaving the car and Chris killing them. She pursed her lips as Lydia’s voice filled up the car.

“Is it really that big of a deal?” Lydia asked. She put her book down on her lap.

“Yeah” Stella shrugged and continued. “I mean, we know where they’re headed. You don’t have to be that nervous Ally.”

“You don’t know what actually happened” Allison said, shaking her head.

“I was there that night Allison” Stella said and then as she looked outside, she continued. “Besides… I know who started it.” As she placed her chin on her hand, she heard Allison but as soon as she heard her cousin talking to her, she looked back frowning.

“Is that what Aiden told you?” Allison’s question seemed to interest Lydia as well, making her to look at Stella, raising her eyebrows. Stella felt really uncomfortable feeling that two of them were focused on her but as she raised her eyebrows, she managed to keep a sarcastic voice.

“Aiden?” she asked, questioning both of them. Allison raised her eyebrows, looking at her cousin. Stella laughed. Her eyes went between Lydia and her. “Woah, woah, woah. Hold on a second.” Stella fixed the way she was sitting in the car and looked at her cousin with a smile. “Is that why you invited me on this whole little road trip thing? Are you saying that my weird hallucinations are not the reason why I am here?” Stella’s hand fell down to her lap once she saw the way Allison was looking at her. “Oh my Gosh. You’re keeping an eye on them and me.”

As she turned to the window, Allison spoke again. “So there’s nothing going on between you two?” she asked curiously.

“I’m appalled by the insinuation” Stella said, offended. After finding out Aiden was one of the big bad alphas, Allison expected Stella to end everything between them and that’s what Stella told her she did. But to be honest, Allison didn’t really believe her cousin.

“Nothing?” Allison asked with a big smile. As Lydia laughed at the two cousins, she pulled out a lipstick. As the lipstick touched her smiling lips, Stella looked pretty annoying.

“Nothing” she replied, placing her hands on her lap but again, annoyed but again she couldn’t help the soft smile that caused by the memories of few days back.

_**** Aiden cover Stella’s lips once again with his as he grabbed Stella by the waist and pulled her more to himself. As Stella’s green lose shirt lifted up and made her feel more of Aiden’s hands on her bare skin, she stopped the kiss._

_“What do you think you’re doing?” she asked frowning. She was sitting on the desk in Coach’s office and as her hands were on the back of Aiden, she was looking at his face._

_“What do you mean?” Aiden asked, pulling himself back._

_“I mean your hands” Stella said, trying to breath properly._

_Aiden was looking at her, confused. “They’re on your waist.”_

_“I know” Stella protested. “What am I, a nun?” With a fast movement, she placed her hands between his messy hair and licked her lips, making Aiden to grin. “Put them somewhere useful.” That’s when Aiden reached out for her and put his hands on her thigh, lifting her up. As she pressed herself more to his body, she heard Aiden asking if it was better. “Moderately” she answered, tilting her head. Aiden smiled, putting her back on the desk and started kissing her neck hardly, making her close her eyes as she moaned. ****_

Stella snapped out of the memory, seeing Lydia looking at her meaningfully as she was fixing her lipstick. “What?” She asked, making Lydia and Allison to laugh. Stella didn’t bother as she started looking outside from the window. She looked at the yellow bus in front of them, thinking. She laughed softly and sarcastically as she looked at her cousin and her friend. “Okay, if the part where you mess with me is over, we can move on to the part which we are realistic” she said quickly. She turned in her seat as far as the belt allowed her to and looked at her cousin and then her friend. “You guys really think Stilinski doesn’t know we’re following them?” Allison stopped the car due to traffic and looked back at her cousin. “Yes, he is a pain in the ass kid but after me and Lydia, he is kind of the smartest person I know.” She stopped, raising her hand. “No offense Ally but you know it’s true.” Allison pressed her lips together, looking outside. The honking echoed inside the car, coming from the others causing Stella to think how much she hated rush hours and she’s lived in New York. “And by the way, aside from the fact that we are running low on the gas, the last thing I want is to ride in that yellow bus where it’s all testosterone and sweat. I am not even talking about what would Chris do to us if we ever leave the car behind. We are not supposed to be here Allison! I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but we are not actually acting towards our promise.” Allison nodded, knowing that as she placed her head on the wheel with a soft sigh.

The traffic was pretty bad for this hour of the day. Not a single car was moving, and it didn’t seem like they were going to move anytime soon.

Three girls startled when Lydia’s phone started ringing all of a sudden. Stella saw the caller Id from the corner of her eyes. It was Stiles. Instantly, she smiled saying I told you so.

Lydia rolled her eyes as she answered the call and tried to find a valid excuse. “Hey, Stiles. Yeah, we’re just about to walk into a movie, uh, you know, the popcorn and the… oh-kay.” Lydia pulled the phone away from her ear and put it on speaker, making everyone to hear Stiles’ anxious voice.

“Okay, look, Scott’s still hurt” Stiles informed them.

“What do you mean still? He’s not healing?” Stella asked, holding the back of her neck anxiously. She could see the anxiety sparks flying around in her cousin’s eyes and without realizing she grabbed the inner cheek between her teeth.

“No, he’s not healing. I think he’s actually getting worse. The blood’s turning, like, a black color.”

“W-What’s wrong with him?” Lydia asked, she was worried about Scott as well.

“What’s wrong with him?” Stiles repeated the question sarcastically and continued after a dramatic pausing. “I don’t… Do I have a PhD in lycanthropy? How am I supposed to know that?”

“We need to get him off the bus” Allison said, she gulped and frowned with anxiety rising inside her.

“And take him where, a hospital?” Lydia asked, looking at Allison and then looking back at the phone.

“If he’s dying, yeah.” Allison’s voice was shaking. Lydia and Stella shared a worried look between them as Allison was softly shaking her head. It was only obvious that she didn’t want to believe Scott wasn’t healing.

“Stilinski, there’s a rest area about a mile up” Stella said, feeling her cousin’s anxiety level. She straightened her back and took a deep breath. “Tell the Coach to pull over.”

“Yeah, I’ve been trying” Stiles said, exhausted. Stella knew how challenging coach could be, she knew how stubborn he was but there was nothing she could do.

“Well, reason with him” Stella said, resting her head back on the couch. 

“Reason?” Stiles said in disbelief. “Have you met the guy?”

“Last time I’ve checked, I was taking one of his classes Stilinski” Stella said, exhausted and sarcastic at the same time. Then she stopped and when she started talking again, her voice was sharp as a knife. “Just try something.”

As the conversation ended there, there was nothing any of them could do but trust Stiles.

As the students were leaving the bus, three girls got off from Allison’s car and walked fast towards Scott and Stiles. “Jared, you suck! Hey, somebody grab some towels, or a mop, or a new bus.” Hearing Coach’s yelling and spraying the smell of Jared’s puke away, they went into the restroom.

“You suck Stilinski” Stella commented, looking at Stiles as Allison was carrying Scott with his help.

Stiles looked back at Stella. “Yeah, I am aware that it wasn’t an ideal way, but I managed to stop the bus and got us here, didn’t I?” he said sarcastically. As Stella chose not to answer, they put Scott carefully on the floor, right next to a sink. Allison slowly lifted his shirt up to take a look at the wound, only to hold her breath, worried.

The wound was looking pretty bad.

“God” Stella couldn’t help but whisper within her breath. “Why didn’t you tell us?” She was looking at Scott, kneeling down, right next to Allison, in front of Scott.

“I’m sorry” Scott said. His voice was tired, his eyes were apparently fighting to urge to close.

“Okay. Just give us a second, okay?” Allison said with her voice shaking. Stella was still kneeling down in front of Scott, while Allison stood up and looked at her friends. “This shouldn’t be happening. I’ve seen him heal from worse than this.”

As Stella stood up and joined the pack, Stiles looked at Allison. “Okay, what do we do then?” he asked. He was worried about his best friend and didn’t know how to help him. “Do we just call an ambulance?”

“What if it’s too late? What if they can’t help?” Allison asked, not wanting to think about the outcomes.

“We gotta do something!” Stiles practically yelled with anxiety.

Stella frowned, looking at Scott but then looked back at her friends. “You know, it could be psychological” she said. She licked her lips softly, crossed her arms in front of her chest.

“What do you mean, like, psychosomatic?” Stiles asked, knowing it’s probably the longest word he ever used to this day.

Stella looked at Stiles, side eyes. “Somatoformic” she said. Stiles tried to say the word, but he couldn’t, making Stella to continue explaining. “A psychical illness from a psychogenic cause…” Stiles was looking blankly at Stella, moving his hands in a way for Stella to talk in English but then Lydia rolled her eyes and opened her lips.

“It’s all in his head” she explained.

“All in his head?” Stiles murmured to himself but then discovering something, he looked back up. “Because of Derek.” Stella looked at Stiles. Derek… For a moment, she thought about how he fell down with Ennis. They all assumed he was dead because the fall was pretty bad and he was wounded. “He’s not letting himself heal because Derek died.”

“So what do we do?” Allison asked, holding the back of her neck, pressing her lips together.

Lydia pulled out a needle and a thread from her purse. “Stitch him up” she said. Allison sighed as Stella and Stiles looked at the young girl. “I’m serious. Maybe all he needs to do is just believe it’s healing.”

They all nodded, knowing it’s their only plan. They quickly assigned tasks to do. As Stella put towel on the ground, Allison started burning the tips of the needle. “He’s gonna need another shirt. Where’s his bag?” she asked, still burning the needle.

“Um, I’m gonna get it. I hate needles anyway, so…” Stiles quickly responded but when he was about to leave them alone, he looked at Allison. “Uh, do you know what you’re doing?”

“Yeah, my father taught me” Allison answered. It was a part of the Argent training.

“I mean, how fast are you gonna… I mean, the bus could leave” Stiles continued with his obvious anxiety.

Stella looked at Stiles. “Well, you just make sure it doesn’t leave” she said harshly.

“I can help. C’mon” said Lydia, pulling Stiles with her out of the restroom. When it was just the two of them, Stella looked at Allison and then kneeled down in front of Scott once again, alongside of her cousin.

“C’mon, okay. Stay with me. Stay with me” Allison said, trying to thread a needle. Her hands were shaking because she was scared and anxious.

“I’m tired” Scott said, making Stella to put her on his shoulder and squeeze a little too hard.

“Look at me Scott” she said, not wanting Scott to fall asleep. Sleep was the last thing he needed right now. He needed to be awake. He needed to stay conscious. “If you sleep right now, I’ll shove a bat covered in wolfsbane up in your ass, you understand?” Behind her sarcastic and angry self, there was anxiety and she didn’t know if it was obvious, but Stella could feel the fear and the anxiousness rising inside her.

Scott’s eyes were half closed, half open, Allison to speak with a worried face. “Scott,” she said, gulping. “Just keep looking at me. Look at me please.” Allison’s voice was shaky as her hand. Then Stella figured out what her cousin needed. She put on an emotionless expression and empty face and stone-cold face. She got up and looked at her cousin who was still trying to thread the needle. She could offer to do it, but it wasn’t going to help her cousin at all. Allison didn’t like to feel powerless and needy. So this was the only best idea Stella managed to come up with in a short amount of time.

“Unbelievable” she said with no emotion in her voice or in her face whatsoever. She crossed her arms in front of her chest, frowned down. “One simple little task? You can’t thread a needle?”

“I’m trying” Allison said, her voice was breaking. She wet the thread in her mouth and tried again. She failed and she was gonna keep failing if she wouldn’t calm down.

“Well, you want my sympathy? You want me to do it for you?” she asked mercilessly, raising her eyebrows. The sneer in her face kept getting deeper by the second and Stella was being mean to her cousin the way she’s never been. “Because you’re just a 17-year-old little girl and this is all too much for you to handle. Well, get over it. You were the one who wanted to be strong.” She paused, took a deep breath. “Thread the needle.”

“My hands won’t stop shaking” Allison said, stating the obvious.

“Breathe. Allison, breathe!” Stella said. She walked up to her and kneeled down next to her. She saw Allison taking a deep breath. “Try again.” She tried again but couldn’t do it. She grimaced with anger and grief. Stella knew she was about to cry by the look on her face. Allison screamed, trying to free herself from the emotions she was feeling, making Scott to startle and open his eyes slowly but it didn’t take long to close them again. Stella was still worried about him but her priority was Allison for the moment. “Okay. How do we approach a situation like this?” she asked, looking at her cousin who started sob softly and silently. “Allison!” she yelled out when Allison didn’t answer.

“Clinically!” Allison took a shaky breath. Stella told her to keep going. “And unemotional- unemotionally.”

“Then stop crying and do it.”

Allison took another breath. Her hands stopped shaking and as soon as she threaded the needle, she leaned onto Scott and did what she was supposed to do.

When they were done, Stella and Allison were both looking at Scott, trying to wake him up. “Scott, stay with me. Okay, stay with me!”

As Allison was taking care of his wound, Stella pressed her lips together and looked at Scott and then yelled out. “Scott!” She said as high as possible. That’s what woke Scott up. First, he didn’t know where he was. He was just murmuring.

“It’s my fault” Scott said, exhausted. It looked like he didn’t know what was happening, like, he was having a fever or something. As Allison was cleaning his wound, Stella placed her palm on Scott’s heated cheek. She grimaced, worrying about him.

“Scott, look at me” young girl said. “It wasn’t your fault.” Her eyes flickered with so many emotions that she wasn’t going to let out. “Derek was not your fault.” As Scott looked at her, Allison was done with the wound. She took a deep breath with relief as Scott kept looking at Stella with sad puppy eyes.

But then he looked down at his wound and then to Allison. “Did you do that?” he asked, Allison nodded. He tried to smile softly. “It’s nice.”

As Allison let out a soft laughter in relief, Stella smiled. “Anything that comes out of Lydia Martin’s purse is nice” she said to ease the environment. Scott and Allison chuckled at her, meanwhile Allison looked at her cousin. As the two girls looked at each other, Allison thanked her silently, making Stella to smile and look back at Scott. “Can you stand?” The Argent girls helped him get off the ground. Allison handed him a t-shirt for him to wear. As he put that on, they started walking towards the exit.

Lydia was the first one to see them and run towards them. “Is he okay? Are you okay?” she asked, worried. Scott nodded her, asking where Stiles was. “Trying to stall coach.” Lydia took the bag from Allison’s shoulder and then turned back to the older Argent. “We still don’t have gas.”

“I’m not leaving him” Allison said, getting Scott’s weight of off Stella and to herself. Lydia and Stella looked at her in disbelief.

“Ah, that’s sweet” Stella said, sarcastically. She kept looking at her cousin. Yes, she was worried about Scott too but… “Guess, we’re leaving the car then.”

“Yeah.”

“What?... Allison!” Stella yelled out, looking at her cousin who started walking away from her and Lydia. “I was just joking! That wasn’t an actual suggestion! Chris will kill us!”

“He’ll understand” Allison said, walking towards the yellow school bus with Scott, leaving Lydia and Stella behind. As the two girls shared a look, they knew they were gonna be in trouble once they were safely back home. At least one of them was going to be.

Stella looked back at her cousin. “Ally! Wait!” She sighed as she dropped her shoulders. “Great. We are so dead.” She rolled her eyes, but she didn’t have any chance but walk to the school bus with Lydia.

When they reached to the bus, Scott was all better and breaking a fight between Ethan and Isaac. Apparently, it was Stiles’ plan. Well, it worked but Isaac and Ethan were already ticking time bombs. So, Stella wasn’t quite sure if this was a smart idea.

As Danny was checking out Ethan to see if he was okay, everyone was looking at Scott and Isaac. Stella walked up to Isaac and put her hand on his shoulder as she thought about the conversation her and Allison had with Chris few days ago, before the whole mess they walked into, they went to help Scott and the others that day.

_**** “Someone needs to help them” Allison said, crossing her arms in front of her chest. They were both standing in Chris’ study. He wasn’t really listening to both of them, but Stella and Allison had to try._

_“Not us” Chris said, not even looking at his daughter. He sat back on his chair, placed his elbow on the side bars and looked up at them. “I’m getting the consulting business back up and running, and you two need to graduate. That’s a normal life. And it’s what we agreed to.” Stella obviously remembered their little deal, not that she was acting towards it or anything. Because that was highly impossible. Stella herself wasn’t exactly normal._

_Chris looked at them one more time and then opened the book in front of him._

_“So, we just ignore it?” Stella asked, raising her eyebrows._

_“We stay out of it” Chris replied, opening his hands to both sides._

_“There is a pack of alphas trying to kill our friends” Stella said, looking at her uncle. It was probably very hypocrite of her to say that considering the things between her and Aiden but the fact was that he meant nothing to her. Besides, she knew the big bad wolf was Deucalion in this picture. The others were just minions. “How do we stay out of that?”_

_Chris leaned back, sighing. “There’s a saying for these kinds of situations, the kind you have to navigate carefully” he said with a flat tone. “It’s called ‘threading the needle’.” Stella looked down, then back up to her cousin and finally her eyes found Chris. He kept talking. “It’s finding a safe path between two opposite forces.”_

_“Sounds like saving your own ass” Stella said, not breaking the eye focus. She didn’t care about the language she was using, she never did. She was highly comfortable with that. She didn’t care._

_As her and Allison were about to leave the room in frustration, they stopped, hearing Chris’ voice behind them. “They’re not your family” he said, shaking his head. This time it was Allison who talked back at him. Two girls stopped walking and turned around to face Chris._

_“With all the family we’ve lost, we could use a few friends.” Then they left the room, hearing Chris’ voice behind them but not caring. They didn’t look back as they walked up to their own rooms, but they knew one thing._

_No matter what happened, they were going to protect their friends. ****_

Stella thought about what happened next. Finding out Deucalion was living in the same apartment as them, Derek planned a secret attack. Stella, Allison, Isaac and the others went there to save their asses. Seeing Derek fall from that high down after the conversation she had with Peter wasn’t exactly the highlight of Stella’s day. She trusted Derek, she still had trust for him in her heart and she was hoping that he was okay after all. 

As all of them got onto the bus, the smell was still there but they had no other choice. The coach was generous enough to let those three girls in the bus, but Stella knew, he wasn’t very happy about it.

Stella was sitting right in front of Stiles and Lydia. She had the full seat to herself. Allison and Scott were sitting in the back, talking and smiling. Stella rolled her eyes. She was glad Scott was okay and well, but she couldn’t believe they really left the car behind.

“Alright, let’s go over this one more time” Stiles said, making Stella to shift in her seat to look at them. “So, it’s the sacrifices right?” he continued, looking at the two girls who were listening to him. Lydia nodded, giving Stiles the sign to continue. “Everything has to do with them and someone who thinks he’s, like, a dark druid of some kind.”

“Or actually is a dark druid” Stella murmured, adding to Stiles’ sentence. As Lydia and Stiles nodded, Stella brushed her hair back and pressed her lips together, putting her chin on the claret red colored seat.

“A Darach” Stiles.

“You know…” Lydia started talking as she looked at her friends. “Some ancient cultures, they sacrificed people in preparation for battle.”

“So, we got alpha werewolves against a dark druid” Stiles summarized, making the girls to nod in confirmation.

Stella sighed, her head full of thoughts. She placed her head on the window, thinking she had lots of things to think about.


	6. MOTEL CALIFORNIA

When they arrived at the first motel that they saw, the sky was dark. The sun was down and it was night time. The motel’s name was Motel Glen Capri and Stella felt bad the moment she stepped outside the yellow bus and her shoes touched the ground. There was something wrong with the hotel. As the others got off the bus as well, she had a chance to look at the building. She fixed the bag on her shoulder as she licked her lips nervously, hearing Scott’s voice in front of her.

“I’ve seen worse” he said, making Stella to roll her eyes and look at the werewolf who was wearing a purple shirt now and carrying his red sport bag.

Stiles’ reaction was the same as Stella’s. “Where have you seen worse?” he questioned, still looking at the motel. Stella sighed, letting them talk and turned her head to look at her cousin and her friend. Lydia was also feeling off, uneasy about all of this. As she grabbed her upper lip between her teeth and Lydia was looking at the motel, she thought about the conversation she had with Peter.

_**** Stella got off the staircase she was sitting on and looked at the werewolf across her, rolling her eyes. Peter was standing in front of the desk, leaning against it as he was looking at the young Argent._

_“How many times do I have to tell you?” she said, sounding pretty exhausted and tired of this meaningless conversation. Peter was having some trouble accepting the fact that she didn’t know anything and that was getting on Stella’s nerves. “I don’t know where the hell these hallucinations are coming from. I don’t know what this scream is about that clearly, werewolves can hear to their bones. I don’t know how I knew you were gonna be a, well, walking dead.” She pointed Peter as she continued. “But if you do know, please, feel free to share it with the class.”_

_Peter frowned, keep looking at her. “How could I know when even a living breathing Argent has supernatural powers is an unknown and strange thing to me?” he said with a little bit of sarcasm. To be honest, what he did to Lydia was a lot similar to Stella’s deal. Kind of. Both seemed to feel and sense deaths, but they were also pretty different. A lot different. “I’d say you’re like Lydia but at this point, I don’t know what you are.”_

_“No” Stella said, stopping pacing and standing still. She looked up at Peter with a sharp expression. “You can’t get away with I don’t know. Not with this. You know something Peter. You’ve been avoiding, trying not to tell me about the fire. I gave you the answers you wanted. Now give me the answers I want.” ****_

Stella snapped out of her thoughts with Coach’s loud voice. “Listen up. The meet’s been pushed till tomorrow.” He was holding up the room keys. “This is the closest motel with the most vacancies and least amount of good judgement when it comes to accepting a bunch of degenerates like yourselves.” Stella raised her eyebrows as she kept listening to coach. At the same time, she was leaning against the school bus and trying to figure out why this motel bugged her that much. “You’ll be pairing up. Choose wisely.” Coach pointed at their direction. “You will have one room, girls.” Stella pressed her lips together, nodding softly and took their key from his hands and walked back to Allison and Lydia. She was okay with sharing a room with them, there was no one else she’d pick, obviously. Maybe if Aiden was here… She shook her head, getting rid of the thoughts. Aiden was the last person she could think of right now. “And I’ll have no sexual perversions perpetrated by you little deviants” Coach yelled as people took their keys from his hand. Stella rolled her eyes, seeing Ethan and Danny pairing up. Shocker, she thought. She didn’t want to see one of her close friends getting close with a slut from the alpha pack but then again… Who was she to talk? “Got that? Keep your dirty little hands to your dirty little selves!”

As the school bus drove away, Stella looked at the motel again. Lydia stopped right next to her, same as Stella, looking up and down at the motel, making Allison to stop and look at her best friend and cousin who were seemed to be terrified of something. “Lydia? Stella?” Her voice was full of worry as she continued. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t like this place” Stella said, trying to keep her voice as flat as possible, trying not to show an emotion or anything but she was scared, and her anxiety was not helping at all. She felt like she was drowning and even with the thought of staying here for the night was giving her the chills in so many bad ways.

There was just something off with this motel.

“I don’t think the people who own this place loves this place” Allison said, looking around and smiling softly. She was trying to calm them down. Especially Stella who may haven’t been showing much to the world, but she was Allison’s cousin and she knew her well. “It’s just for a night.”

“A lot can happen in one night” Lydia murmured, looking at the motel. But then again… they had no choice but walk towards to their room.

Stella acted first, going to the restroom. She had to pee really bad. If she wasn’t going to pee anytime soon, then she felt like she was gonna explode.

After she was done, she washed her hands and then looked at the mirror to fix her hair but jumped back with the thing she saw.

She startled when she noticed that her eyes weren’t brown. They were bright blue, and they were glowing.

Like, like werewolf eyes.

Stella shut her eyes, inhaled a deep breath and then opened them back. When she looked back at the mirror, everything was normal besides her heart who was beating like crazy. She gulped, taking a deep breath and giving it back. No. No, it wasn’t right. It was happening because of her conversation with Peter. He was playing with her mind.

That’s what Peter wanted.

Stella got out of the bathroom, not wanting to stay there for another second. As Allison started walking towards to the room Stella got out, she stopped her. “Ah, you don’t wanna use the towels in here. I swear, someone smoked four packets of cigarette there.” She threw herself on the cheap bed, grimacing. Lydia rolled her eyes, she was still standing in the middle of the room. Allison frowned, looking at her cousin but softly chuckled. “Anyway, I’ll go get some new towels. This room is drowning me anyway.”

“Yeah” Lydia said, looking at Stella who was getting off the bed. She felt like she needed to get out of this room as well. “I need to get some fresh air.” As Allison nodded, Lydia and Stella grabbed the old towels and went to the little cabin that had reception sign in front of it.

As Lydia and Stella put the towels on the front desk, Lydia murmured “Excuse me” to the old lady to get her attention. “The card on the dresser says we have a non-smoking room.”

Stella rolled her eyes, taking a breath in between her teeth. “But somehow all of our towels reek of nicotine.”

Old lady turned to them, making them startle and Stella to take a step back with reflex. She couldn’t help but feel like she was in a horror movie and hardly took her eyes off of the thing that was in her throat.

“Sorry about that, sweetheart” said the lady with a soft smile that was a little bit scary as well. Her voice was raspy, more like someone’s voice that’s been smoking ten packets a day. Lydia and Stella tired to look anywhere but the thing on her throat but the only thing that caught their attention was the number on the wall.

Lydia frowned. “What’s that?” she asked. “That number?”

“It’s kind of an inside thing for the motel. My husband insists on keeping it up” the lady explained. Stella and Lydia frowned, not understanding. As the lady felt their confusion, she laughed softly. “It’s a little bit morbid, to be honest. You sure you want to know?”

“Tell us” Stella said, feeling her anxiety reaching new heights, boiling up inside her. Lydia gulped as the lady started talking.

“We’re not gonna make the top of anyone’s list when it comes to customer satisfaction” lady said.

Stella moved her eyebrows. “No way” she whispered.

“Obviously” Lydia murmured to herself. 

“But we are number one in California when it comes to the one disturbing detail” the woman continued, not hearing them. The girls kept listening to her carefully, fully focused. “Since opening, more than any other motel in California, we have the most guest suicides.” The lady was smiling like it was a good thing, meanwhile Lydia was terrified, just like Stella who was looking at the number.

“198 suicides?” Stella and Lydia asked at the same time, trying to hide the fear in their voices. 

The lady laughed, making Stella and Lydia to share a terrified look. “And counting.”

They finished up telling Allison the story while she was drying her wet hair with the new towels the girls brought. She looked at Lydia who was pacing up and down in the room and Stella who was tapping the phone to her empty hand.

“198?” Allison asked, frowning curiously.

“Yes” Lydia answered heatedly. Stella was trying to focus on the conversation, but her mind was going crazy. One second, she was thinking about the Darach, and the other second it was alpha werewolves and then it was the suicides again and then she was going back to Derek. Inside of her brain felt like a battle field and she was the one losing the war. “And we are talking about 40 years here. On average, that’s… 4.95 per year, which is… actually expected. But who commemorates that with a framed number? Who does that? Who?”

“Some psychos who has pipes on their throats like villains in the horror movies and talk about suicides like it’s a funny thing?” Stella sarcastically guessed, raising her eyebrows and looking at Lydia. As the young girl rolled her eyes as a response, Stella tilted her head like telling her to give her a break. “You can’t tell me that is not true Martin.”

They spent few minutes in silent. They all were thinking, doing something else in the same room. Allison put the towel down on the dresser, Lydia was finally sitting down and thinking what the hell they were going to do and Stella was walking up and down in the room when she finally stopped and parted her lips to get their attention. “I… I need to call someone” she informed them. “I’ll be right back.”

Without saying anything else, she let herself out of the room and walked away to a distance where Allison and Lydia wouldn’t hear her. She looked at her phone for a while, took a deep breath and finally found Derek’s name on her contact lists.

But right when she was about to press it to call him, she heard a voice.

“Which- Which one do you want?” It was a man’s voice. Stella looked around to see where was this voice coming from. She was alone, standing in the hallway. No one was in the open area or in front of the motel but she knew it was coming from somewhere near. She frowned, not seeing anyone. She waited for a while, thinking maybe she imagined things but then she heard another one.

“I don’t know” the voice said. It obviously belonged to a woman. “The smaller one, I think.” Her voice was shaking, obvious that she was scared. Stella frowned more, looked at the door that belonged to the room she was few steps away. She didn’t know how she knew but she felt like the voices were coming from there. 

She started walking slowly as she heard them again. “It’s okay. Smaller is better. There’s less kick” the man said. “I’ll chamber the round.” Stella didn’t know who they were. They didn’t sound familiar and obviously not from the team, therefore not from Beacon High but put her hand into a fist as she squeezed every muscle in her. “Alright, so-”

He was interrupted by the woman. “Wait, wait” she said. “When do I… I mean, do you count?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll count to three” the guy responded. Stella swallowed hard. She didn’t know who they were, but she could guess they were lovers. Stella’s heartbeats got faster as usual; she couldn’t think straight.

If she could, she would walk faster.

“So, after three or on three?” the unfamiliar woman voice asked as Stella walked up to the room’s door and placed her ear on the door, just to be sure if the voices were actually coming from there.

“You tell me” the guy softly whispered. Stella started shaking her head but when she noticed it was her whole body that was shaking, she also noticed that the girl started to count. Stella heard the last ‘I love you’s before the gun shot.

She startled.

She opened the door quickly and expected to see blood and two dead bodies but there were only paint boxes and supplies for the restoration. She walked around, trying to figure out what the hell just happened, only to see nothing. There were no proof of two people being here and killing each other. She took a deep breath. At least, she tried to.

Then she heard Lydia.

“Hello?” Lydia’s shaky yet loud voice reached to her. It was obvious that she continued, telling something to Allison but Stella couldn’t hear what was it when all she could hear was some distant blathering.

Stella walked up to their direction. When Lydia opened the light, they saw her, too. “Stella?” Allison questioned curiously, surprised to see her here on her own. She really wanted to learn what was happening.

“It had to be right here” Stella murmured. Lydia looked at Stella, freaking out. In that moment, Stella knew that she wasn’t alone when she heard the suicidal couple. “You heard them too?” she asked, really hoping Lydia to confirm.

Lydia nodded. “There was a guy and a girl” Lydia said, looking at Allison. “And I mean, they sounded younger, but… they were here.” Stella was still looking around while Lydia was explaining to Allison.

At least, she was trying to.

“I believe you” Allison said with confidence, taking a step forward. Stella took a deep breath, she hated everything that’s been happening. But seeing the support from her family made her relax. Even it was for a brief second. “After everything we’ve been through, I believe you.”

Few seconds later, they were back in their room. Lydia quickly reached for her purse and looked at the Argent girls. “You know, there is something seriously wrong with this place” she said and then quickly added. “We need to leave.”

“Lyds, I want to get out of here as much as you do” Stella reacted immediately, causing her to stop what she was doing and looked at her. Meanwhile Stella licked her lips and as she took a deep breath, she continued. “But we left the car way back, we have no gas, we are in the middle of nowhere and my uncle probably can’t come here at this hour.” Lydia exhaled as she continued picking up her stuff. “How can we even leave?”

“I don’t know!” Lydia screamed, throwing his fabric bag to a side. Her hands were shaking out of fear. She quickly looked at Stella and then Allison. “All I know is that if I spend another second in here, I’m going to lose my mind.”

Allison knotted her eyebrows in confusion. “But they were suicides, not murders” she said and then continued. “And it’s not like this place is haunted, right?”

“Maybe it is” Lydia answered, looking at her friend. “You know, I bet that couple made their suicide pact in that very room. Maybe that’s why they’re renovating. Maybe they’ve been scraping brain matter off the wood paneling.”

Stella grimaced with the thought of that and turned to Lydia to look at her. “Hey!” she yelled in disbelief, opening her hands to both sides. “Did you really have to carve that image into my brain?” Well, it wasn’t like she didn’t thought of that possibility, but she was so messed up that she was hoping that she’d turn out crazy. Even that would have been a great support. At least, she’d have a treatment and never hear couples who were making suicide pacts and weird voices that called out her name. But to be honest, she knew she wasn’t crazy.

Well, technically not.

“Maybe we should find out” Allison suggested. Knowing there was nothing else they could do, the girls out of their room to go to reception. There was no one to be seen but Stella stopped moving the minute she saw something in the front desk, a difference on the wall. Allison noticed that as the same time with her, quickly opened her mouth. “Didn’t you guys say the sign said 198?” Allison asked, making Lydia to frown and look at the sign which she could sworn that it was 198, instead of 201.

“It was 198” Stella said, still looking at the 201. “I swear to God, it was 198.” She looked at her cousin, spooked.

Allison seemed to be frightened too. “Okay, what does that mean?” she asked, wondering. She looked at them. “That there’s been three more suicides?”

“Or three more about to happen” Lydia responded, making the girls to look at the sign again.

After the incident in the front desk, they quickly found Stiles and as they made their way to the girls’ room, they told him everything. “Last time, I saw Scott act like that was during full moon” Allison said finishing up their story. Stella remembered Allison’s story about how Scott was so spaced and walked in on while Allison was taking a shower while the others were getting fresh towels from the reception.

“Yeah, I know. He was definitely a little off with me, too” he agreed as they all kept walking. He breathed in and continued with a frown. “But actually, it was Boyd who was really off. I watched him put his fist through the wending machine.”

“See, it is the motel!” Lydia screamed. “Either we need to get out of here right now, or…” She reached for the bible in the drawer. “Someone needs to learn how to do an exorcism asap, before the werewolves go crazy and kill us.” She shook the bible towards others which Stella thought it wasn’t appropriate way to treat the holy book but as she crossed her arms and raised her finger, there was something else she wanted to say.

“I know how to do exorcism” Stella claimed, making Stiles to look at her in shock. Stella shrugged and then she kept talking. “Besides, I don’t think you should shake The Bible like that, Martin.”

Lydia rolled her eyes. Stiles tried to take the control but even he couldn’t deny the fact that this is what he would normally do during situations like this. Sarcasm was his only defense, after all. But they had a serious matter in their hands, and they had to focus. “Okay, just hold on, alright?” he said to calm Lydia down and then continued. “What if it’s not just the motel? The office in the number went up by three, right?”

Allison put her hands on her hips as she looked at the young man. “You mean, like, three sacrifices?”

Stiles continued, confirming her. “What if this time it’s three werewolves?”

Stella nodded, frowning. They had four werewolves in hand. “Ethan, Scott, Isaac and Boyd” she murmured and then looked up to her friends. “Maybe we were meant to come here.”

“Exactly!” Lydia screamed in fear. “So, can we get the hell out of here now? Please?” Lydia scanned the faces in the room as Stella just took a deep breath and brushed her hair back nervously.

“Wait, hang on.” As Stiles’ voice filled up the room, he was looking at Lydia and pointing the Bible in her hands. “Let me see this.” He grabbed the Bible from Lydia’s hands and looked between the pages till he found a piece of a newspaper. As three girls leaned into read, Stella instantly knew that it was a suicide news. “28-year-old man hangs himself at the infamous Glen Capri” Stiles read the news. As he went through the pages, he saw that there were more.

“Oh, no. Look at this two” Lydia said as she was looking at the piece of newspaper on the bed. “They both mention the room 217. These are probably all the suicides that happened in this room.”

“So, if every room has a bible…”

Lydia completed Allison’s sentence. “There could be articles in all the rooms.”

Stella grimaced, moving up and down her eyebrows. “That’s perfect” she said sarcastically. “I’ve been to too many hotels and motels and there are usually chocolate and mints. Paper and pen, at worst… but this…” She shook her head. “This hotel has bibles that has suicide and death articles inside them. I’m almost sure we are living in a horror movie now.” But then she stopped, closing her eyes. “I just had a bad thought.” Opened her eyes back and looked at her friends. “What if the room next door has the one about the couple?”

With the thought, Stiles ran to the room next door, followed by the three girls behind him. He tried to open the door, but it was locked. Young man frowned like the rest of them. Stella instantly remembered that it wasn’t locked before.

Stiles took a breath and looked at the girls, showing them the door is locked. “No, that was not locked before” Lydia said, knotting.

“Forget it, we need to get Scott, Isaac and Boyd out of here” Allison yelled, making Stella to look at her with a frown. 

“Does any of you remember that Ethan is also a werewolf?” Stella asked. Well, she wasn’t friends or anything with him whatsoever, but it didn’t mean that she was going to let him die like that. Because him dying meant that the dark druid was one step closer to their plan. She couldn’t let it happen.

No one commented anything. Stiles started walking away with Allison and Lydia by his side. Right when Stella took a step forward, she heard something that made her stop on her spot. It was a running handsaw. She’s heard that voice a lot because her favorite movie, or the horror movie she’s watched the most was Texas Chainsaw.

God bless Texas, she thought.

But then she heard the voice again and went back to the situation in her hand. “I am not the only one who heard that, am I?” she asked, nervous.

“It sounds like someone turned on the handsaw” Allison said, Stiles went back to them and stopped right between Lydia and Allison.

“Handsaw?” Stiles yelled in shock and then ran back to the room, tried to open the door. This time, it opened with no force, making them to see Ethan taking the handsaw to his naked stomach. Stella parted her lips in shock as Stiles yelled again. “No, Ethan! Don’t!” He tried to take the handsaw between his hands. As they were dangerously fighting about it, Lydia found the plug and pulled it to herself. Right when Stiles was about to fall on the handsaw, the machine stopped.

In that moment, Stella realized she was holding her breath.

As Stiles fell down to the ground, Ethan didn’t stop. He clawed out and tried to rip his stomach. This time it was Stella who tried to hold his hands and save him. Stiles went to her help. They were no near to a werewolf strength but they were trying.

And then Ethan fell onto a hot thing and that was what made him snap out. Stella was looking at him, still breathing like crazy.

Ethan got up and looked around. “What happened?”

“Didn’t you hear what I just said?” Ethan asked as he was buttoning up his shirt and walking away from Stella, Stiles, Allison and Lydia. The young Argent rolled her eyes as she kept following him down the stairs. “I don’t know how I got there or what I was doing.”

Stiles started talking. “Okay, you could be a little bit more helpful” he snapped, walking right past Stella. “We did just save your life.”

“And you probably shouldn’t” Ethan said, turning back and walking a little bit faster, leaving them behind.

As Stella watched him get inside his room, she heard Lydia. “So, what now?” she asked curiously, dropping her arms down to hit her legs.

“I’ll find Scott” Allison said, few steps up from the staircase. “You guys grab Isaac and Boyd. The best thing we can do is get them out of this place.” She stopped and as she licked her lips, she looked at Stella. “Stella, you…”

“I’ll go talk to Ethan” Stella finished her sentence. She knew this wasn’t what Allison was going to say and she knew Allison wasn’t going to approve her talking to Ethan, but she didn’t give her a chance to say something against it and started walking towards the direction Ethan walked away.

“What are you doing here?” Young girl startled as she heard Ethan talking. She immediately closed the door, put the bobby pin back to her pocket and faced the alpha who wasn’t wearing any shirt. Ethan shook his head. “You know what? That’s not my question. How did you get in here?”

Stella quickly scanned the room before looking back at Ethan and talking. “I’ve had lots of practice” she said, smiling. “I can break any lock I want.”

Ethan raised his eyebrows and kept his gaze on Stella. “You could have knocked” he said in frustration.

“Would you open the door?” Stella responded, raising her eyebrows as well. Ethan didn’t answer but Stella knew what he would have said. She shook her head, causing Ethan to roll his eyes. “Exactly what I thought.” She scoffed and looked around. He seemed to be alone in the room. “Anyway… Where’s Danny?”

Ethan scowled at her. “None of your business” young man answered as he grabbed the black shirt from the bed and put it on. Stella rolled her eyes as he continued. “Look, you sleeping around with my brother doesn’t mean I am going to be nice to you. You are still an Argent and you are the enemy.”

Stella placed a smile on her lips, tilted her hand and pouted sarcastically. “Me sleeping around with your brother doesn’t mean I’m going to be nice to you as well. You are still part of the alpha pack and you are the enemy” she said teasingly. She took a step towards him and continued. “But this Dark druid, Darach or whatever the hell you wanna call it… Now, that’s a problem that concerns all of us, Ethan and not too long ago, you tried to kill yourself because of it.” She stopped, chuckled and shrugged like it didn’t matter. “Of course, it’s your problem. Not mine. Not really.”

“Why are you really here, Stella?” Ethan asked with a very blasé voice. He was standing near the bed with his arms crossed in front of his chest, looking at the young girl. He knew she wasn’t here because she cared for him. No, there was something else.

Stella smiled for a moment, looked around and then as she looked back at him, she tilted her head slightly to the side. “How is Ennis?” she asked curiously, trying to change the topic to Derek. She saw Ethan flinched, but it was matter of seconds. He chose not to answer. Stella softly smiled, shaking her head slightly. Before she continued, she straightened her back and looked at him. “To be honest, Ethan, I don’t care about Ennis. I don’t think your precious alpha cares about Ennis either. All I care about is Derek. You know what happened to him.”

“Even if I did, what makes you think that I would tell you?” he asked, raising one eyebrow as he folded his arms before his muscular chest.

“I don’t know” Stella said, letting out a sarcastic laughter. “We’ve just saved your life.” She paused and then added. “Twice. We didn’t have to. It would be just a lot easier for us to let you die.”

Ethan laughed. “You wouldn’t do that” he said. “Everything I feel, Aiden feels.”

Stella pressed her lips together, hearing what Ethan said but then she felt her lips were moving up, forming a soft smile. “It’s cute how you think I care about him” she responded, grinning meaningfully. She laughed, mocking him and then kept talking. “But Aiden… he is nothing but a distraction for me. He means nothing to me. But this thing we are talking about, now that’s important. So back to that; Derek. Dead or not?” Stella raised her eyebrows, waiting for an answer.

Ethan responded with a firm, strict expression. “Dead.”

Stella slightly shook her head to both sides. “I don’t believe that.”

“You _don’t want to_ believe that” he corrected her teasingly. “There is a big difference.” He frowned. This time, he was mocking her. “Aren’t you supposed to be the Clever Argent?”

Stella scoffed in disbelief, licked her lips, and stepped towards Ethan and didn’t stop until she was standing a lot closer to him. She looked up at him in his eyes threateningly. “You think I wouldn’t hurt you because Aiden is gonna feel the same thing, Ethan” she said, lowering her voice. Her glance was though, determined. “But you know what? You can make sure your werewolf ass that when it comes to that, when it comes to killing you, Aiden is not even on the list of the things that I’ll worry about.”

Without saying anything, she turned back and walked out of the room.

Just few steps later, her phone buzzed in her pocket. She kept walking, thinking it was Allison but when she saw the caller ID, she stopped in shock. It was Aiden calling right after she had a conversation with Ethan. She answered his call and put the phone on her ear and parted her lips without giving him a chance to speak up. “What now?” she said as she scoffed. It wasn’t likely for him to call her since he should’ve known that she wasn’t in town because they’ve talked over text, so she was curious. “You feel whenever I talk to one of you now? Poor Ethan.”

She heard Aiden laugh from the other line as she kept walking to the school bus. There was no way in hell that she was going to sleep in that awful of a motel room.

“You talked to Ethan?” Aiden asked, not believing what he heard. He was only calling Stella to check up on her due to orders and trying really hard to cover up the other reason why he was calling her. He was confused but he wasn’t going to talk about that nor even think about that. “I thought you hated him.”

“Ah, I still do” she quickly responded to him. “I just needed to ask him something.” She bit her lip, not sure what she was doing. It wasn’t like, Aiden was going to answer her or say something about it. Maybe… Just maybe, he would’ve but she wasn’t completely sure.

“It was important enough for you go and talk to someone you hate?” Aiden questioned. Stella let out a small laughter, hearing Aiden and his little scoff. They were doing this for over three months now. And she was pretty surprised when she saw how much Aiden knew her. Well, almost…

“Actually, yeah” she said, her hand going through her brown and long hair. She was still walking, and she could see the parking lot that the school bus was parked at. She took a deep breath. “I was hoping he would say what happened to Derek but…”

Aiden let out a breath as she got angry at himself for what he was about to do. “About that, Stella…” As Aiden started talking, Stella stopped but not as a reaction to Aiden at all. She saw Scott, facing the other way but she could see the red jerry can and she could smell it from all over him. In his other hand, there was a burning flare. With just a simple touch, Stella didn’t think a reaper or Hades would care about Scott being a werewolf.

Allison, Stiles and Lydia were looking at him with full of despair. Tears were streaming down on Allison’s face; Lydia’s chest was going up and down with all the sharp and broken deep breathes and Stiles was looking at his best friend with the most broken expression Stella has ever seen on anybody.

She started walking towards them without even commanding her feet to do so. In the back of her mind, Stella knew Aiden was going to tell her something important but right now what happening felt more important than everything right now. “I gotta go Aiden” she softly whispered with an empty voice. She hung up the call, put it back into her pocket and stopped walking when she was standing next to Lydia. She could see Scott better now, how broken he is. She gulped, seeing his face, the feelings he was carrying on his expression. She knew that, she’s seen that every time she looked into the mirror.

She suddenly felt like someone was crushing her heart and felt definitely worse when Scott started talking. “There’s no hope” he said, his voice shattered in a way of showing his pain.

“What do you mean Scott? There is always hope” Allison said with red eyes but forcing a smile on her face. She was trying to be strong for Scott. Stella knew that it was killing Allison, seeing her first love like that. She always wanted Scott to be happy, to be okay. This was the reason she broke up with him even though she still loved him.

“Not for me” Scott responded, sobbing. With every moment passed, the light in his eyes were disappearing. Stella hated it. Living it was one thing but seeing it on someone close to you go through that was just heartbreaking in so many ways. “Not for Derek.” Hearing his name, Stella’s hand curled into a fist to stop the shaking but didn’t hold herself from shaking hear head and tried to make Scott feel better.

“Derek wasn’t your fault” Stella managed to say with the numb in her throat. She couldn’t help to keep her voice still. It was a little bit shaky. “You know Derek wasn’t your fault.” She’d never have guessed that she’d have this life before coming to Beacon Hills. She would never have guessed that she was going to find these people. She had friends here. No, she had close friends here that she considered them as family and she wasn’t complaining.

“Every time I try to fight back, it just gets worse” Scott continued with tears in his eyes. “People keep getting hurt, people keep getting killed.” He wasn’t looking at them as he was talking. He was looking down on his feet. Even though Stella knew it wasn’t him talking, her eyes filled with tears. She wasn’t crying but her eyes were burning, and she knew they were filled up with tears.

“Scott, listen to me, okay? This isn’t you, alright?” Stiles said, taking a step forward. His voice was shaking too. His eyes were flickering with bright tears. He couldn’t bear to see his best friend like that... So hopeless, so broken... He just couldn’t. “This is someone inside your head telling you to do this, okay? Now-”

Scott interrupted him. “What if it isn’t?” he asked in brokenness as his voice was shattering, shaking. “What if it is just me?” Allison covered her mouth with her palm, trying to hold back the sobbing. Scott took a deep but troubled and shallowed breath and continued. “What if doing this is actually the best thing that I could do for anyone else?” He inhaled. “It all started that night, the night I got bitten. You remember the way it was before that?” His sentences kept getting cut by his breathes that he was having trouble inhaling. Stella saw Stiles nodding with the corner of her eyes. He had tears forming in his eyes like the rest of them. “You and me, we were… we were… we were nothing. We weren’t popular. We weren’t good at lacrosse.” Another struggle breathing… “We weren’t important. We were no one.” Stiles clenched, listening to his best friend. Stella inhaled, looking at Stiles with a worried look. “Maybe I should just be no one again.” Stella looked back at Scott, watching him look at them with his brown eyes covered in pain and misery. “No one at all.” The flare in his hand tilted to the side.

“Scott, just listen to me, okay?” Stiles said quickly. His voice was shaking but Stella knew he had it under control. Each second that Stella couldn’t cry, her throat burnt more. Her eyes were burning but all she could do was watch those two best friends try to heal each other. “You are not a no one. Okay? You’re someone. You are… Scott, you are my best friend.” Scott started tearing up. One tear escaped his eyes and followed a trace down to his chin. At this point, Stella couldn’t see Stiles but she knew that he was the same. “Okay? And I need you.” Stiles was walking towards him slowly but surely. “Scott, you’re my brother. Alright, so…” He stepped into the gas puddle, making Stella to gasp quietly and cover her mouth with her hand. “So, if you’re going to do this, then…” He held the flare with Scott and looked right in his eyes. “I think you’re just gonna have to take me with you.”

Allison and Lydia were crying, watching the scene in front of them but all that was happening to Stella was just shaking and shivering, throat burning.

But then all of a sudden, Stiles grabbed the flare between Scott’s hands and tossed it away from them and from the gasoline. Stella exhaled deeply and stepped back in relief. Right when she thought everything was okay and over, a wind flew the flare right to the puddle.

“No!” Lydia screamed, jumping onto Stiles who grabbed Scott away from the puddle. Stella and Allison jumped to opposite sides to cover themselves from the explosion. 

Stella could feel the heat but as she looked at the fire, she saw a shape between her hair that was covering her face. She saw someone with a ripped off face and a black dress. The scary thing’s eyes were focused on her and as Stella heard a loud scream in the back of her head, the thing in the fire kept looking at her. 

Stiles helped her get up when the smoke cleared and Scott was better now. As he felt she was still shaking but not because of what happened with Scott, but because of the thing she saw in the flames, he felt worried about her. “Please” she yelled out, she pulled her hand away from Stiles and wrapped her arms around her body. “Please, tell me I wasn’t the only one who saw that!” Her voice was still shaking as well as her body and when she saw Lydia, she immediately knew that Lydia saw it too. Her hands went through her hair and she kneeled down, closing her eyes. As she opened them back on, she took a deep breath, stood up and pointed the motel, shaking her head. “There is no way in hell, I am going back to that motel.”

As Allison looked at her cousin understandingly, Stiles nodded. All of them agreed with her and felt the same way as her. “It’s okay” he said slowly. He was still in shock as well. This time, he pointed the yellow school bus. “We’ll sleep in the bus.” Stella looked at Stiles, nodding. They all went back to the bus. Lydia and Allison sat down on the same seat. Scott and Stiles took one seat each and Stella went way back, in front of the seat that Isaac and Boyd sat on as they joined them later on. As Stella controlled down her breathing, she leaned against the window and in seconds, she was asleep.

“I don’t wanna know.” They all woke up as they heard Coach’s voice, shouting inside the yellow bus. Stella instantly opened her eyes but then narrowed them as she looked at the Coach who was now wearing a white shirt. She moved on her spot, straightened her back. “I really don’t wanna know, but in case you missed the announcement, the meet’s canceled, so we’re heading home.” Stella stopped listening to the Coach when she saw Ethan and Danny getting in the bus. She grabbed Isaac’s jacket that she was using as a pillow and stood up to sit on the seat in front of Allison and Lydia. The Coach was still shouting when she placed the jacket on her lap. “Pack it in. Pack it in!”

The coach walked over the driver, Ethan glanced at Stella and sat right next to Scott. “I don’t know what happened last night,” Ethan started. He wasn’t looking at them, he was looking straight ahead. “But I’m pretty sure you saved my life.”

Hearing what he’s said, Stella frowned and Stiles quickly intervened. “Actually, I saved your life, but not that it matters that much” he commented. “It’s just… Just a minor detail.”

Ethan sent him a deathly glare but then ignored him and looked at Scott. “So, I’m gonna give you something” he said and then quickly continued. “We are pretty sure Derek’s still alive.” The minute he said it, Scott raised his eyebrows in shock and Stella’s lips fell apart as she straightened her back. “But he killed one of us” Ethan continued without giving any of them a chance to speak. “That means one of two things can happen. Either he joins our pack…”

“And kills his own” Scott completed his sentence.

“Or Kali goes after him and we kill him” Ethan added. “That’s the way it works.”

As he got up, Stiles started talking after him. “You know, your little code of ethics there is sort of barbaric, just FYI” he yelled as he stood up and sat next to Scott. He was about to look at his best friend and say something but as they all noticed when Ethan sat right next to Stella instead of Danny, they all looked back at him, focused on what he was going to say to her.

Stella looked at him with a silent thank you that she didn’t even believe she was doing. Ethan rolled his eyes, understanding that. Even though he knew it was hard for her to thank anyone but he also knew that he didn’t give this information by his own freewill.

Not exactly… 

“Don’t thank me” he quickly responded to her silent gratitude as his voice came out almost like a whisper. “Aiden was the one who wanted you to know that Derek was alive.” He laughed sarcastically. “Guess the sex is that good.”

Without saying anything else, Ethan got up and walked up to Danny while Stella could feel the others looking at her. Right when she was about to roll her eyes, she noticed something that prevent her from doing what she originally had in mind. She stopped the Coach quickly who was walking towards Ethan, calling out for him. “Hey, Coach, can I see your whistle for a second?” She quickly grabbed the whistle from Coach’s hands with a frown and ignored him yelling at her, telling that he is gonna take that back. 

Stella ignored him as she took the whistle to her lips, placed her hand on the back of it, the empty part and blew. When she looked at her palm, there were purple dust. She showed it to Stiles and Scott. “Wolfsbane” she announced as Stiles was looking at Scott and then back to Stella.

“So, every time the coach blew his whistle, Scott, Isaac, Boyd…” Lydia started.

“And Ethan” Stella added.

“We all inhaled it” Scott finished their sentences.

“You were all poisoned by it” Allison said, leaning in.

“So, that’s how the Darach got in their heads” Stiles murmured, thinking as he kept his hazel eyes on his friends. “That’s how he did it.” He paused for a second and suddenly without thinking, he grabbed the whistle out of Stella’s hands and threw it out of the window. The Coach immediately yelled Stiles’ name but then the bus started moving and it was too late for him to get it back.

As the bus went on the road, Stella inhaled a deep breath and rested her head against the window, watching the road go by and thinking about how screwed up they were. 


	7. CURRENTS

“I’m not going to spy on Aiden” Stella said as she made a maneuver to park the car in front of the hospital. Scott’s bike was in the hospital for some reason and he needed to talk to Stella about something so he called Stella and asked if she could take him to the hospital to bring food to Melissa for the night. Stella was onboard with it, only because she was bored at the home and didn’t really want to do homework.

And now they were in front of the hospital, getting out of the car. “Stella-” Scott tried to fight back but got interrupted by the young girl who was rolling her eyes and as she placed her arms on the top of the car, she looked at him over it.

“Look Scott” she sharply said, looking at him in the eye. “I can’t just keep asking him questions or be sneaky around him. He’d notice something’s up. What do you think we are doing when we’re alone?”

Scott narrowed his eyes, getting the hint that Stella’s been telling him. “So, you’re saying that he’s not asking you anything?” he curiously asked. “Anything at all.”

Stella rolled her eyes. “No, he’s not.” She stopped, dangled her shoulders with exhaustion near her body and then continued. “Scott, I don’t even talk with Allison about Aiden. Like, at all. Mostly because she doesn’t approve what I’m doing or who I’m doing it with. And you’ve learned a lot more than she could ever learn, okay?” She softly and slightly shook her head. “Let it go.”

“Stella, Aiden is dangerous” Scott responded, walking next to her. “You can’t trust him.”

Stella locked the car and they started walking towards to the hospital’s automatic doors. She looked at Scott and opened her mouth. “I am not stupid” she said, walking into the hospital halls with Scott by her side. “I obviously know that and I obviously don’t trust him. I just-” She didn’t have the time to finish that sentence. Suddenly, Scott started smiling and Stella saw Melissa walking towards them from the corner of her eyes and she fixed herself, placing a smile on her face as well.

Scott pulled the food up to show Melissa. “Oh, thank God! I’m starving” she exclaimed the minute she saw the food. Stella slightly chuckled but, at the same time, she looked around, trying to hide her frown. The hospital seemed pretty busy tonight. Meantime, Melissa grabbed the takeout and put it on the counter and then she stopped and walked back to two teenagers as she realized she forgot something. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” She hugged Scott and then Stella as she continued. “Thank you for bringing me dinner.” Stella softly smiled, knowing she was distracted and thinking it was because of what was happening around them. 

“Is everything okay?” Scott asked, worried about his mom.

“Except for the half the accident victims in a ten-car pile-up being rerouted here from downtown, and the E.R. attending not answering any of his paged, yeah, I’m okay” Melissa responded as Stella moved on her spot nervously and Scott focused on something that his mom said.

“What does not ‘answering pages’ mean?” he asked frowning.

Melissa took a deep breath and as she sighed, she answered her son. “It means nobody can find him” she said and as soon as she finished talking, some patient walked up to them asking if she can have some pain killers. As Stella and Scott shared a concerned look, Melissa looked at the woman who was apparently in so much pain. “Okay, I’m sorry, I know. But, actually, giving you something could complicate things, so we really just need to wait for the doctors. Okay?” She held the woman from her arms and helped her sit down. She looked at Stella and Scott one last time before went up to talk to someone about when the doctor was going to be here.

After Melissa left them alone, Scott slowly walked up to the patient and sat right next to her on the seat. “Uh, I think, I read it online…” he started while Stella crossed her arms in front of her chest, looking at Scott and the woman. “… that, sometimes, human contact can help with the pain.” The woman nodded slightly, not knowing what else to do. Scott softly reached for her hand to hold it between his hands and as she looked away, the black veins appeared on Scott’s body, showing Stella that he was taking her pain away. The woman sighed in relief, looking at Scott. Stella started smiling softly but then as she heard a familiar voice, she turned her head to her right to see that Ethan was carrying Danny inside.

“Someone… Someone help me! I need help!” Ethan yelled as he looked around. Danny didn’t look any good at all. He looked pale and he was struggling to walk as well as breathing. “I need help!” Stella left everything and ran to Ethan to grab Danny, at least help Ethan carry him. She was angry but also worried. She was nearly sure Danny was in this shape because of Ethan and she was ready to kill him.

But she knew that she needed to make sure Danny was okay first.

Melissa walked up to them quickly to help them sit Danny down while telling them to do it slowly. Stella held her breath, seeing Danny in pain. He was one of her closest friends and she didn’t think she could take if something were to happen to him. Especially after everything that’s happened in Motel Glen Capri only a week ago or so. 

As they let go off Danny, Stella walked up to Ethan and grabbed him by the arm, pulling him to herself. Due to her anger, she was a lot stronger than a normal human being. “What did you do to him?” she shouted angrily. Scott was looking at Danny but also on high alert as he watched them but Stella wasn’t sure if he was on guard for her or Ethan.

“Nothing!” Ethan screamed, answering her and taking a step forward. Maybe he was trying to look tough, but as well as not being in control with her anger, Stella didn’t really care about this retreat of Ethan at all. “He said he was having chest pains and trouble breathing, but it… it just kept getting worse.” Seeing worry in Ethan’s eyes, Stella let go of his shirt. She wasn’t a big fan Ethan and she didn’t like him at all but she knew Danny liked him a lot. It was just Stella, not being sure if Ethan was using him or he was actually into him because ‘love’ and ‘like’ terms were so far away from Stella. She didn’t understand or know anything about them at all. 

“This is not good” Melissa said, checking Danny’s throat. She looked back above her shoulder and yelled. “How much longer on Dr. Hillyard?” The nurse shook her head, told them that she didn’t know. Melissa turned back to Danny and started informing Stella, Ethan and Scott who looked really worried for him. “His larynx shifted to the side. I think it’s a tension pneumothorax.”

As soon as Melissa stopped talking, Danny leaned forward and threw up everything in his stomach. As Stella and Ethan stepped back with reflex so that his puke wouldn’t come on their shoes, Stella noticed something weird on the floor at the same time as Ethan did.

“Is that…?” Stella meant to ask but before she could finish her question, out of the corner of her eyes, she saw Ethan nod and then part his lips.

“Mistletoe” he murmured, confirming Stella, making Stella’s gaze to move to him and then to Scott and then finally land on Danny.

They quickly carried Danny onto one of the stretcher beds. “Can you three please go back to the waiting room?” Melissa asked in hurry.

“Where are the nurses and the doctors?” Ethan asked, worriedly opening his hands to both sides as he kept walking with the rest of them. “Where is everyone?”

“It’s a full house tonight” Melissa explained. “They’re tending to other patients.”

“Okay, well, how can we help?” Stella asked, worrying about her friend. She couldn’t just wait when Danny was dying in front of her eyes. Darach was, yet again, messing with the people she cared about, and she was going to kill whoever that was with her bare hands once she found out who the hell that was.

“Honey, you can’t” young woman said. Her gaze moved from Stella to Scott and Ethan as she continued. “His lung is collapsed. His heart is being pushed against his chest cavity, so…”

In that moment there was only thing Stella could think of. “He is going to die, isn’t he?” she said in fear, hoping with her entire heart that she was wrong.

Melissa started looking around as she was thinking what to do while Stella felt Ethan’s glance on her. But then they heard Melissa and her determined voice. “No” she said before she looked back at them. “No, he is not going to die. Scott, you grab the tape. Stella, grab the scissors and cut his shirt open.” Stella and Scott started to do their parts quickly as Melissa looked at Ethan. Even though she didn’t trust him like the rest of them, she needed his help too. “Ethan, can you keep him still?” Young man nodded Melissa, put his hands on his boyfriend’s shoulders who was laying on the bed in agony and pushed him to the bed on his shoulders, keeping him still.

“Mom, he’s not breathing!” Scott yelled, Melissa looked at her son and leaned back. She thrusted the needle into Danny’s chest quickly and very harshly. After a while, as Danny started to breath again, Stella felt like she was breathing again with him. She sighed and a smile formed up on her face in relief.

“Thank you” Danny murmured softly but gratefully, looking at Melissa.

“No problem.” Melissa looked down at him with the huge smile on her face but when she felt three people were looking at her, she lifted her head up and her gaze moved from Danny to the others. “What?” She couldn’t help but asking between her breathes while she was still smiling.

“Melissa, believe me when I say this” Stella started, she was looking at her with her eyes flickering and a huge smile in relief. She sighed with the thought of Danny was being okay and safe. “That was awesome!”

Melissa shook her head humbly. “It was no problem, you know? I mean, it wasn’t a big deal” she murmured. Stella kept smiling, looking at Melissa, just like Scott and Ethan. 

After a while of spending time with Danny and looking after him, Stella knew he was okay and she left the hospital, leaving Danny behind with Scott and Ethan to take care of him now. She walked up to her car, knowing that Scott was going to use his bike to go home.

As she got into her car, there were millions of thoughts running around in her brain. She really thought Danny was going to die tonight and she’s never been this happy that she turned out to be wrong. But still, she couldn’t catch up with her mind and it was driving her nuts. Finally, she decided to call someone that she’d always call to distract her mind.

“Hey” Stella said when he picked up the phone. She licked her lips, making them wet and stopped at the red light. Her hands found the back of her neck. She was a little nervous, thinking about the fact that mostly Aiden was the one who would call and not Stella. But she didn’t really care. She needed it tonight. “Are you free?” Her voice sounded tired and even the other person at the other line noticed that.

“I am not home right now, but you know where the spare key is” he answered but the minute he said it, he instantly knew Stella regretted ever calling him and he knew she was trying to find an excuse. So, he quickly stopped her. “Stella.” His voice was firm. “It’s okay.” Stella exhaled, looking at the red light and listening to him. “I’ll be there in 20 minutes tops. Go there and wait for me. It’s okay” he said and then laughed amusingly. Stella could see his smirk even without actually seeing him. “You sound like you really need that tonight.”

She couldn’t help her soft smile but didn’t say anything as she took a deep breath. “Okay” she said after a while and then she paused. “Hey, Aiden… I, uh… Thank you.” She grimaced and without giving him a chance to react, she hung up the phone.

She watched the light turn to green and then she quickly drove to Aiden’s place.

Scott who decided to leave the hospital half an hour later than Stella, was walking up to his bike when he heard Ethan behind him. He stopped on his spot and look at him as the alpha twin started speaking while looking at him, walking behind him. “I know you’re not going to believe me, but I didn’t do anything” he explained himself, both reaching up to Scott’s bike and standing on the opposite sides. He was looking at Scott directly, trying to show Scott how serious and sincere he was.

Scott sighed, not knowing what was true anymore. “All I know is that the minute you got here, you went right for Danny, and your brother went for Stella and Lydia” he responded, looking back at Ethan as he remembered seeing Aiden around Lydia as well. He wasn’t the way he was with Stella but he was also pushing limits with Lydia as well.

Gay twin took a deep breath. He didn’t know how to show or tell Scott, more importantly Stella, that he really cared for Danny. He didn’t want to admit it but as far as he’s heard, Stella was a lot scarier to Ethan than Scott ever was. “We’re not going to hurt him” Ethan said, trying to convince him.

“Why should I believe you?” Scott asked, looking at Ethan.

“Because we knew one of them was gonna be important to you” Ethan said, opening his hand to sides. He moved on his spot before continuing to speak. “And now we know it’s Stella and Lydia. It’s up to you which is more but both of them are red line for you.” He looked into Scott’s eyes and then continued. “You see them as your sisters, you care about them.”

All Scott could do in that moment was taking a deep breath and looking at Ethan.

Ms. Blake put the book on the desk and looked at the students across her. Stella looked up at the board with the sound of book meeting the desk. As she noticed the smile on Ms. Blake’s face, she couldn’t help but roll her eyes with a grin.

Stella wasn’t stupid, not to realize something was happening between her and Derek. She noticed, ever since she’s met Derek, Ms. Blake had this freaking butterfly smile on her face and Stella was just waiting for the right time to mess with Derek about this, but she didn’t really have the time to talk to him for a while now.

Stella shook her head but then suddenly, for some reason, she remembered few days ago. The memory of Aiden sneaked into her mind, the time when she went to Aiden’s house after the hospital. Like he said, Aiden wasn’t there but came about 10 minutes later than Stella and they did something they’d never done before. They talked. Not that they told each other everything but, in that moment, Stella felt great because of the reasons she was too afraid to find out.

_**** Aiden was half laying on the couch, feeling really tired. He wasn’t wearing any shirts as he was staring at the wall, thinking without even realizing what he was thinking about. Ever since he met Stella, it was a lot harder to do the things Deucalion asked him to but he didn’t want to admit anything. Not that he was aware of it anyways but he knew something was different._

_Before even he could let himself to think about what that was, he snapped away from the thoughts he didn’t even know he had when he noticed Stella walked in with two cups of coffees in her hands._

_As soon as he saw her, he straightened up and put his gaze on her, causing Stella to part her lips with a grin. “You two didn’t even know where everything was, did you?” Stella commented, handing one of the cups to Aiden. Young man grabbed the cup, smiling back. “You start to smile whenever I came through those doors with a beverage or food.”_

_Aiden moved on his spot nervously and slightly so it wouldn’t be too obvious to Stella. “Even werewolves gotta eat, right?” he murmured, taking a sip from his coffee. Stella rolled her eyes, chuckling. She drank from her cup but at the same time she was looking at Aiden behind her eyelashes._

_All of a sudden, she took her cup on the coffee table and looked at him, like she was trying to build up the courage to say something and she finally managed to do so. “Thank you, by the way” she said, pulling her leg under her as she turned to Aiden. She frowned at the same time because sentences like ‘thank you’ was a new thing for Stella. “I mean, I…”_

_Aiden knotted his eyebrows, looking at Stella and smiled softly. “For what?” he said when she didn’t finish her sentences._

_“You convinced Ethan to tell me if Derek was dead or not” young Argent murmured as Aiden put his cup on the table near him. “I mean… I, uh…” She nodded nervously. “You didn’t have to and I…”_

_“Stella, it’s okay” he said, shaking his head. It was becoming very uncomfortable for the both of them and he felt like he had to stop her._

_“But why did you do it?” she asked curiously. She brushed her hair back, slapping herself in her brain for asking such a dumb question or even bringing up this situation in the first place. What the hell was happening to her? That… Now, that was a million-dollar worth question._

_“I, uh, I don’t know” Aiden responded. Stella kept looking him with frowned eyebrows and a curious expression but then all of a sudden, she burst into laughter. It was few moments away from turning into hysterical._

_“Oh my God” Stella said, trying to calm her laughter. Aiden raised his eyebrows, looking at her as he was confused by the sudden mood change. “Aiden! You are not just an emotionless bad alpha twin! I can’t believe this.”_

_“Ah, shut up Argent” Aiden said, laughing at her reaction but only making Stella to laugh harder._

_“C’mon Aiden, even I wouldn’t do something like that!” she said, tilting her head softly. “You have emoti-” Aiden interrupted her, pressing his lips onto hers, shutting her up which she was very grateful about._

_Aiden pulled back, his eyes filled with lust as he looked at her. Stella was now speechless and couldn’t look away as he spoke. “Enough with the talk” he said before she grabbed Stella by the thighs and pulled her onto his lap. ****_

“Good morning” said Ms. Blake, snapping Stella out of her thoughts. She had a smile that made Stella want to punch her, but it was because she was actually pretty nervous for some reason. But as she turned back to her drawings, she sighed, tried to ignore her and also trying to push away the memory of her and Aiden. “As you all know, Mr. Harris is still missing… I mean, sick.” Stella raised her eyebrows, looking up at Mr. Blake who was getting nervous by the second. “Anyway, I’m filling in while we all hope and pray for a more qualified substitute to take my place.” It was obvious she wasn’t very happy that she took this job. After all, she was an English teacher and not Physics. Stella chuckled softly at the irony as she frowned and focused back to drawing but she was also listening to her. “Okay, so, let’s get started, shall we?”

As soon as Ms. Blake turned back to the board, Stella saw Stiles turning to Scott and whispering to him. He kept his voice loud enough for only Stella to hear.

It was such a big luck that Stella was sitting alone that day.

“Hey, my dad said that the E.R. attending wasn’t strangled but did die from asphyxiation” he informed them, making Stella to look at him as she frowned. “They just don’t know how.”

“Do you think the on-call doctor could still be alive?” Scott asked, looking at Stiles and Stella. They both sighed and shake their heads, telling him that they didn’t know.

Stiles seeing Stella’s reaction, he looked at her and opened his eyes widely. “How can you not know Stella?” he heatedly asked. If they weren’t in class in that moment, his voice would’ve probably gotten a lot higher than that as he kept his gaze on Stella in disbelief “You feel nothing, like, nothing at all?”

Stella rolled her eyes. “What am I? Hades or something?” She yelled in a lower voice, just like his reaction to her not knowing. “What now, am I supposed to just feel whenever another someone dies? Are you aware of how many people die in a day averagely?”

Stiles rolled his eyes but he didn’t know what to say to that argument so he decided to look at his best friend. “But, Scott, there’s got to be at least 20 other doctors in that hospital… At least, okay?” he said, emphasizing the word ‘at least’ as his gaze moved between Scott and Stella who agreed with him but didn’t know what else to do. “Any of them could be next.”

Scott nodded, confirming Stiles but then his phone buzzed and for anyone not to hear, he acted quick and took it to his ear. Stella and Stiles looked at each other as they frowned and looked back at Scott who was now talking to the phone. “Hey, Doc” he said. “Sorry, I’m in class right now. Can I call you back?” Stella looked at Ms. Blake’s direction, but she didn’t seem to notice. Scott listened what Deaton said. Stella had no idea what it was. All she knew the phone went off after that and Scott kept calling his name and then when he didn’t get any answer, he quickly got up and ran off from class.

Seeing this, Ms. Blake looked at Stiles and Stella, to the door and then back to them as she was waiting for an excuse for his action. “Anyone want to explain what that was?” she asked, holding up the pen in her hand.

Stella and Stiles looked at each other.

Stella could see Stiles’ brain was totally empty, not able to think of a good excuse. So, she opened her mouth and she started to speak. “His… His mom” Stella said. It was the first thing that came to her mind in such a short time. “There was a text message from his mom. There was an emergency. You saw the look on his face, Ms. Blake. He wouldn’t wanna leave like that. He promised himself this school year would be better.” Ms. Blake observed her, trying to figure out if she was lying but then nodded and went back to the board. Stella moved to Scott’s seat, next to Stiles really quietly when the teacher’s attention was back on the topic again. “I guess I know who our next doctor is.”

Stiles pulled up his phone. “I’ll text my dad” he said as he found his dad on his contacts.

When the bell ring, they went their separate ways. Stiles tired to find others and reach out to Scott and his dad. Meanwhile, Stella tried to find Allison but instead, she ran into Aiden and few minutes later, she found herself in the Coach’s office, getting intimate with him. She had no idea what happened but as she took Aiden’s red sweater off from his muscled body, she couldn’t think about anything else but him.

She smirked as Aiden grabbed Stella’s waist and pulled her to his body, placing his lips behind her ear. Stella put her hands on his chest, moving it down to his pants as she felt his lips moving down to her neck from her ear but then, hearing the fire alarm, Stella pulled away with a frustrated sighed, rolled her eyes but grabbed her books and walked towards to the door.

“Aw, man” Aiden complained and looked at the young Argent with a frown and a grin. He was still leaning against the table with his shirt off. “Where are you going?”

Stella stopped moving when she heard Aiden’s question. She turned towards him as she moved on tongue on her lips. “It’s a fire alarm” she said, chuckling and meaning to walk towards the door again but had to stop one more time when Aiden put his hand on her waist and forced her to face him with a smirk.

“When in high school has a fire alarm actually been a real fire?” Aiden questioned as he grinned, pulling her to himself more.

Stella pressed her lips together but only to hide her smile. “That’s exactly the kind of thing you’d expect two dumbass students to say just before getting burned alive” she responded as she put her hand on his cheeks. But then pulled herself away and took a deep breath. “But I am not a dumbass and I am not really open to the idea of burning alive.” Aiden laughed, looking at her while Stella freed herself from Aiden’s touch. She raised her eyebrows and titled her head to the side, pointing the door. “After you.” She expected him to put his shirt on and get out of the office Aiden had different plans. He grabbed her by the arm, stood up and pulled her towards his naked torso and tried to kiss her neck but Stella took a step back, dodging his kiss. She pulled her hand to herself to pointed the door again with her index finger. “Go, Aiden.”

Aiden grinned but he put his shirt back on and walked out of the door. Stella waited for a while, trying to calm herself. She brushed her hair back to fix it because of Aiden’s hands, it was pretty messy and she couldn’t get out looking like that. She exhaled, checked herself in the small mirror next to the door and then grabbed the door handle to open it, only to see Derek’s sister Cora standing in front of her. It was the first time Stella’s seen her since that night at the vault but she could say without all the werewolf rage, she was actually a classic Hale wolf. Brown hair, deathly glares in the eyes, a signature Hale scowl…

“You don’t have a very good taste in guys, do you?” she asked with a sarcastic grin on her face, looking at Stella. Young Argent let out a soft scoff in disbelief and took a step forward but had to stop when her way was blocked by the annoying little sister of the king of the dumbasses.

Stella looked at Cora who slid in front of her. “Is there a problem sweetheart?” she asked, looking at her.

“Yeah” Cora responded. The annoying grin faded away on her face as she kept looking at Stella, this time with a deeper scowl and firmer expression. “Derek would like to kindly ask you to stop seeing Aiden, which means if I catch you with him again, I’m not going to pull the fire alarm.” She formed another grin which only made Stella to want to tear her apart in the spot in seconds but a) it would have been too late till she pulled the gun out that she didn’t have on right now and b) she didn’t want to deal with Derek on this. “I’m going to pull your tongue out of your head.”

Stella only laughed at this stupid threat, not giving a damn about the ultimatum. “Honey,” Stella said, smiling. “I am an Argent who finished her hunter training long ago.” She frowned sarcastically, grinning. “I think I can handle a werewolf.” Stella’s hand reached out to the door again, but Cora grabbed it and squeezed it tight. Stella let out an angry yet annoying chuckle. Her muscles got tensed as she parted her lips. “Let go” she said. Cora kept smiling annoyingly and Stella thought she would enjoy punching her in the face. “I said…!”

Someone interrupted her. “Let go” he said. It was Stiles, standing in front of the door. He came here after seeing Aiden coming out from the locker room and then Cora stepping in. He was suspicious and he was glad he came in after her. “She said let go.”

Cora let go off her wrist, Stella’s hand wrapped around it as a reflex as she looked at Stiles.

“I’m not like Lydia” Stella repeated herself for the tenth time, looking at Stiles. They were walking down the hallway, talking about the problem in their hands. She was acting like Cora wasn’t there as they were trying to find Lydia, but she was definitely paying a visit to Derek after she could escape from Stiles and Cora. “I know you want to help Deaton and I do too, but you’d have more luck with Lydia. Not me. That’s what I told you right after class. I don’t know why you didn’t listen to me the first time I’ve told you that.”

“But you feel something too, right?” Stiles insisted. “Scott told me about the thing with the Heather and in the vault.”

Stella nodded, thinking about where Lydia might be. She tried to think what her schedule was as she kept walking. “Yes, but my thing is different” she said and without thinking she continued. “Peter said…” She closed her mouth, realizing what she has said. She felt Cora and Stiles looking at her.

She closed her eyes as she sighed and heard Stiles. “Stella-”

“Stiles” Stella interrupted him. She stopped walking and looked at his face. Cora and Stiles stopped as well when Stella continued. “Like I said, Lydia can help you guys more. Not me. I can’t help you. Not with this.” She looked at Cora out of the corner of her eyes. She sighed frustratedly and then looked back at Stiles. “I have a Hale to visit.” She pressed her lips together, shaking her head. “Find Lydia. I can’t help you.”

And then she walked away, leaving them. 

“Now this looks interesting” Stella said, walking inside and moving her eyes around. The loft was filled with water and they were holding cables. Apparently, Isaac, Derek and Boyd were trying to do something with the electricity. Stella knew that the moment she saw the cables and decided to stay in the dry spot where there was no water whatsoever.

She leaned against one of the columns and crossed her arms in front of her.

“What are you doing here?” Isaac asked curiously, making Stella to answer without looking at her curly friend.

“Someone sent his sister to the school to interfere in my personal life” she said, watching Derek as he moved but not give a damn about what she’s said. “Why did you do that, Derek? Are you worried about me? Honestly, my eyes are tearing up.”

Derek rolled his eyes at her sarcastic comment, stopped walking and returned her gaze. “So, what now, you like him?” he asked and then added a little pity and sarcasm as well as he continued. “Maybe even better, you love him.” He stopped, scowled. “He is a werewolf, Stella.”

Stella was listening to Derek, clenching her teeth. Her lips were pressed to each other. She looked at Derek, dropping her shoulders to her side. Her expression was strong and sharp as she parted her lips. “I don’t love anyone. You should have known me by now” she said sharply and as she strengthened her voice, she continued. “Besides… I can handle a werewolf. It comes with the last name Argent, if you’ve forgotten.”

“He’s an alpha” he reminded.

“You are one too and I can handle you” Stella said, raising her eyebrows and looking Derek sarcastically. As Isaac and Boyd were smirking, trying to hold their laughter, Derek rolled his eyes one more time but before he could say something back Boyd threw the cables into the water and make them electrocuted.

Everyone looked at the water.

“Is this gonna kill them?” Isaac asked, looking away from the water to the people around him. Stella dropped the Aiden subject and pushed every thought and opinion behind as Boyd’s voice filled up the room.

“I hope so” he said, looking at Isaac.

“Tell me how to be helpful” Stella said, all of a sudden, making three couple of eyes to look up at her. Stella raised her eyebrows as she continued. “Look, Hale pack 2.0…” She pushed herself away from the column and put her hands into her pockets. “Scott, Allison, Lydia and Stiles are trying to find where Deaton might be. Scott and Allison know what happened last year and they want me out of it.” She sighed. “I can’t be much of a help anyway because I don’t know what I’m doing and Lydia is much more helpful when it comes to situations like that.” She took a deep breath and looked at the alpha. “But you know me, Derek. I don’t just sit around… I can’t just sit around and not help. I can’t do that. Not again. Not after running away last year.” She stopped, stretching her hands to both sides. “If anything happens today, I won’t talk to Aiden ever again. If you guys are lucky, he’ll die anyway, right? Even if he doesn’t… If he shows up, if he does anything… I am done. You get your wish.”

Derek thought about the deal, looking at his Betas and then back to Stella. “Do you have your gun with you?” he asked, making Stella to lift up her shirt and showing the gun attached to her belt. She grabbed it from her car before she went upstairs to the loft. “Great. If anything goes wrong, you come in. Don’t do anything till I say so.”

Stella shrugged, knowing it was better than nothing. 

“Isn’t the light on that supposed to be on” Isaac asked, everyone to look at the alarm system that was attached to the wall and didn’t have any red or green light on it the way it wasn’t supposed to.

“Yeah” Derek said, clenching his teeth with anger and anxiousness.

“What does it mean if it’s not?”

“Someone cut the auxiliary power” Stella answered as she stood up from the ground she was sitting on. They were waiting for something to happen for a while and now they were here. Stella had no idea which ones from the Alpha pack came here but found herself wishing that it wasn’t Aiden. 

“What about the main…?” That’s when the lights went off, interrupting Boyd. As Stella hid behind one of the columns, she took control of her breathing. She relaxed. Derek didn’t want anyone to know she was there, but everyone knew it was stupid and unnecessary when alpha werewolves were coming for them but didn’t say anything. Isaac and Boyd stood up as Derek looked at the water puddle, took a step in and not get electrocuted. Their plans went down the plughole already.

Derek walked up to the middle of the room. “Derek” Isaac said. “What do we do now?” His voice sounded full of anxiety as Derek glowed his eyes to red and focused on the door.

“We fight” he said with determination as Stella checked her bullets.

The door quickly slid open to the side. Barefoot Alpha was standing in front of the door, looking at Derek. Isaac and Boyd went up to Derek’s right and left, stood there as his pack. Stella stayed hidden, just in case.

“Gonna be honest, Derek” Kali started as she started walking inside. Stella pressed her lips together as she listened what she had to say. “When Ennis died, I thought to myself I’d just go for it. Find you and kill you, wherever you stood.” She took the steps down slowly. Derek, Isaac and Boyd were already wolfed out. Because of Stella’s heart racing, Kali probably knew she was there but didn’t seem to care as she kept talking. “Then I remembered how you surround yourself with these teenagers, hiding behind them, and I thought ‘what’s a girl got to do get you alone?’” When Stella looked behind her, she held her breath. Ethan and Aiden walked in with Ms. Blake, totally battered. Her hair was a mess, there were blood on her body. Aiden’s claws were on Ms. Blake’s throat, ready to attack while Ethan tried to keep her still. Stella kept watching, holding her breath. Her knuckles were white for holding the gun too tight for too long. “You and me, Derek, or they tear her apart. What do you say? You think you can beat me one on one?” Derek’s face changed with anger but with a slight head nod of his, Isaac and Boyd took a step back, leaving him alone. As they retreated Kali continued, her eyes on the column Stella was hiding. “And Argent is not going to help you either.”

Stella stopped hiding when she heard Kali. She walked around, came out from behind the column. Her eyes were focused on Aiden as she took out the gun clip with one movement and put it in her pocket as she threw away the gun to somewhere in the room and walked back to where Isaac and Boyd were standing.

“I’m going to rip your throat out with my teeth” Derek told Kali right before they growled at each other. Stella was not feeling any kind of luckiness for watching the alpha cage fight in the front row. She felt trapped just like Isaac and Boyd for not being able to help. They had to stand back so that Ms. Blake wouldn’t get hurt.

Feeling Aiden’s glances on her wasn’t really helpful as well.

Throughout the fight between Derek and Kali, Stella had to stop Isaac and Boyd so many times, just so that Ms. Blake wouldn’t get hurt. Other than that, she was trying not to watch the fight but to think of a way to get them all out of this mess with no one getting hurt. Maybe if she could scream, Kali would get distracted so that Derek could kill her off but it wasn’t something she could turn on and off.

She let out an angry and frustrated breath and then reached for her phone to type without anyone noticing.

**Plan failed. We need help and plan B.**

Every time Kali hit, punched or hurt Derek in anyway; Ms. Blake called out for him, shouted his name and tried to run away from the twins, only for Ethan and Aiden to hold her tighter than before. One of them grabbed her face, forced her to watch the whole thing as she cried.

Few minutes later, Stella’s phone screen lightened up with a text that was sent from Cora.

Isaac and Stella exchanged a knowing look. She let him read the text. She looked around and then found Isaac again. She nodded. Isaac got the sign and ran to Ms. Blake to get him away from the twins.

That’s when the lights came back. Anyone who stepped into the water and whoever was in the water got electrocuted, electricity crackling around them.

“Take him!” Kali ordered to Aiden and Ethan when she was used to the pain. Hearing their order, the twins quickly stepped into the water and held Derek by the arms. They held him back as Kali grabbed Boyd. Stella’s eyes moved on them with her mouth open, trying to understand what they were doing, trying to understand what was happening.

But when she did, it was too late.

Ethan and Aiden forced Derek’s claws to grow out. They held his hand, facing the ceiling. Kali walked over to him, holding Boyd and then suddenly she arranger her angle and dropped Boyd’s body onto Derek’s sharp claws, making both of them to gasp in shock and pain.

“No!” Stella found herself screaming. Her voice echoed in the loft and combined with Boyd’s moa, showing how much pain he was in right now. “Boyd!”

“I’m giving you till the next full Moon, Derek” Kali said as she started walking towards Stella, towards the exit. All Stella could do was focus on Boyd, on his body that was forcefully clawed by Derek. She couldn’t even notice the grin on Aiden’s face, like it wasn’t a big deal. She took a breath in and out, but she was doing this a lot harder and a lot often than she was supposed to. Her hear picked up its pace while Kali continued with another ultimatum. “Make the smart choice. Join the pack.” Aiden walked after Kali and then Ethan joined them. The alpha stopped at the door and looked at Derek over her shoulder. “Or next time I’m killing all of you.”

Stella slid to the right, letting them past the door. Aiden looked at her from the corner of his eyes, but Stella’s eyes were focused on Derek and Boyd, not that she would have looked at him back anyway.

Aiden turned his head and when they left the loft, Stella fell on her knees on the ground. Tears filling up her brown eyes as she kept looking at them. She saw the pain and then heard their voices. “It’s okay” Boyd told him with a husky and sleepy voice. He sounded tired. He had no strength left in him to keep on living anymore as his life strength was moving onto Derek. Stella was watching them, frozen in her spot. Her eyes were red, her throat was hurting but as always, she just couldn’t cry.

“No, no, no, it’s not” Derek whispered, shaking his head, looking at him. “It’s not.”

“It’s okay, Derek” Boyd repeated, tired.

“I’m… I’m sorry” Derek said, his voice breaking. He was looking around like he was trying to find a way to save him, but everyone knew that there was no way. He was dying, and his last moments, he was comforting Derek and somehow himself, telling him everything was okay.

“The full moon…” Boyd continued. “That feeling… That was worth it.” Stella felt tears streaming in her eyes, pressed her lips together as she grimaced. Her chin was trembling. “There’s a lunar eclipse. I always wondered what…” Boyd’s eyes were focused on somewhere, not even looking at Derek anymore as he was talking. He was barely blinking his eyes as well. He sounded tired, exhausted. “What that felt like for one us. For one of us…”

Then he fell off from Derek’s claws onto the floor, not breathing anymore. 

Stella let out a silent sob as she realized her hands were shaking. Her eyes were locked on Boyd’s dead body on the floor, in the puddle of water. Stella’s eyes moved up to Derek for a second and noticed the tears in his eyes. His hands were shaking like Stella’s on the top of his legs.

Then Stella felt someone’s hand on her shoulder but she didn’t bother to look up. Not that she didn’t care but because she knew it was Lydia. As she sobbed, she saw Cora running past her to reach to Boyd with Stiles walking after her.

Stella could hear Cora’s sobbing, her heavy breathes. She saw the way one tear escaped Derek’s green eyes. Stella was too focused on Boyd to think about how it was the first time she saw cry. She saw Stiles put his hand on Derek’s should for support, showing he was there for him.

And then all Stella could ever do was look at Lydia who kneeled down right next to her with a broken yet comforting expression, showing her friend that she was there for her. 


	8. VISIONARY

As the duo walked into the room, Stella stepped right next to her cousin, with a scowl, a firm stance, looking at the man in wheelchair who was facing the other way. They couldn’t see his face but as he felt their presence in the room, old man smirked vaguely. “Mm” he said and then asked, turning his wheelchair towards his granddaughters. “Did you bring him?” As Stella saw Gerard’s face for the first time since last year, she was surprised she didn’t feel any regret for her plan or any kind of gratitude towards him for all the years they spent together. She would never come here if there wasn’t any agreement. Stella hated it but she knew he was their only chance. “Oh, come in Scott.” He eyed all of them for a brief second. Then he rolled up his sweater’s sleeves and thrusted his hand to Scott. “And give an old man a little something for his pain.”

Allison turned to Scott who was standing right next to her and softly whispered. “You don’t have to do this.”

“If you want me to talk…” Gerard said, hearing her. He spoke before giving Scott a chance to say something. Stella was directly looking at her grandfather without breaking her eye contact, but he didn’t seem to care. “This is how’s going to happen.”

“If I do this, you have to tell us everything you know” Scott responded with a flat but firm voice. He started to roll up his sleeves as he took a step forwards to the old man. Then, he held his hand. Stella straightened up the moment she saw the black veins going up from Scott’s hands to his arm. It meant that Scott took some of his pains and it looked more intense than some.

When they unconnected their hands, Gerard was the first to came to and ask a question. “They found a third body?” His voice was rough. It was obvious, he was still in pain.

“Another doctor” Stella answered with a flat and unemotional voice. “Right after Scott found Deaton.” Her scowl was still there, she was feeling nothing but hate for the old man. She hated to be here. She hated to be right in front of him. She hated everything he’s ever done to them, to her cousin, to her mother and to her uncle.

“Right after?” Gerard repeated, raising his eyebrows curiously. “Almost like it was expected he’d survive.”

“What’s that supposed to be?” Scott curiously asked.

“How do you know your dark druid isn’t your wise veterinarian himself?” he asked, cleaning the black blood on his hands. There was some between his teeth and in his nose as well as he continued to speak. “Maybe he knew you’d find him.” Stella frowned, looking at the old man and thinking about what he’s said but she didn’t believe him at all. “Maybe he planned it that way.”

“He would never let anyone innocent die” Scott reacted, being protective over Deaton.

“Don’t be so sure” Gerard said back. “You’d be surprised how far some people would go to get rid of someone like Deucalion.”

Stella laughed sarcastically with no emotions in her brown eyes. “Believe me, I can guess” she said but Gerard ignored her again.

“What about someone like you?” Allison asked, she was distant as much as Stella. Her arms were crossed in front of her chest as she was leaning against the wall.

“I don’t go easily, though, do I?” he said before spitting black blood to the napkin he was holding between his fingers. “You know, Scott, you’ve made me something of a celebrity here. I’m a medical mystery. The cancer is now virtually undetectable, but the doctors have no clue why my body keeps producing and ejecting this bizarre black fluid.” He murmured angrily, wiping his nose to get rid of the black blood and threw the napkin onto the floor. 

“I did what you wanted me to do” Scott said to get back onto the topic they came here for to talk. “Tell us how to beat him.” He was calmer than he was supposed to be. At least, Stella felt that way because she actually felt angrier every time that she looked at him. She wasn’t even here when he brainwashed Allison and then threatened to kill her so that Derek would bite him and his cancer would be gone. She knew as much as they’ve told her.

“You can’t. I’ve tried” said the old man, looking at Scott.

Stella rolled her eyes. “Then this is a complete waste of time” she said, straightening herself up on her spot and looked at her cousin. Then as she headed for the exit, she knew Allison was coming right behind her, understanding her motive. “He doesn’t know anything.” She looked at Scott. “Sorry you did this. Let’s go.”

Scott was looking at the two Argent girls with his mouth softly open in shock when what Stella thought was going to happen happened.

Gerard stopped them. “Wait!” As a smirk formed up on her face with her back facing him, the old man started talking again as she thought he would. “I can tell you one thing” he said as Stella turned back to look at him. “Deucalion may have lost his eyes, but he’s not always blind.”

Stella sat on the sofa next to Scott’s and hit her legs with her hands, keeping her gaze on him as she parted her lips. “Sounds like a story time to me” she said, smiling sarcastically and then wrinkled up her nose. “I hope this time it’s more exciting than the stories you’ve told me before bedtime.”

Gerard finally looked directly at Stella for the first time since she stepped into the room. “Those stories were important, stories that you should know” he warned her.

Stella raised up her hands and softly chuckled. “Whatever you say.”

Gerard didn’t say anything to that as he started telling the story about Deucalion. He told them about the time he met them for the first them. He was talking about the time before they formed up their little alpha pack. “They were all there” he continued his story. “Ennis, Kali, Deucalion… each with their own packs, before they’d kill them all and decided to form their little all-star team.”

“But they didn’t all live here, did they?” Allison asked, frowned curiously.

“No, but there was an exceptionally powerful alpha who did live here” he responded. “She had a capacity to shape-shift that was rare among her kind.” He couldn’t help but look at Stella for a brief second. Stella didn’t notice it as she was focused on the story, listening to his story. “That made her something of a leader, the kind of person that they would go for advice and guidance.”

Stella frowned. She didn’t know how but she knew who her grandpa was talking about. “Talia Hale” she murmured, lifting her head up to look at Gerard. His expression confirmed Stella’s answer before he kept telling the story. There were some plot holes but as she kept listening to him, she thought she didn’t trust him anyway. Plot holes were normal when it came to Gerard telling a story. They could fill the blanks later on, Stella thought. It would probably be more accurate.

They needed the main idea and the concept for the moment.

Gerard told them about the things he and Chris talked about. He told them about the Celtic symbols, how they faced this problem then. Stella and Allison looked at each other, they both thought how Chris was acting weird lately. More mysterious than weird but he was being suspicious.

Allison looked at Gerard. “How does he know all about Celtic symbols and druids?” she asked, interrupting him.

“Know the enemy, Allison” Gerard said as his response, looking at his granddaughter but then continued with his story. “The older wolves had a relationship with the druids. They called them emissaries.”

“Like Scott’s boss Deaton” Stella murmured, looking at Gerard. The old man got up on his foot hardly and walked up to the part of the room where he kept his books. He grabbed one of them and opened a page.

“Do you know the myth of Lycaon?” he asked. Stella nodded, confirmed him as they all stood up and walked up to where he was standing to look at the book he opened.

“I know it’s where we get the word ‘lycanthropy’ from” Scott answered, making Gerard to look at him but then he looked at Stella.

“Why don’t you tell them?” he suggested and then with a sick grin, he continued. “You looked into that necklace, didn’t you?”

At first, Stella looked at her grandfather but then her eyes moved back to the page he opened. She took a deep breath and opened her lips slowly. “According to myth…” she started her story. She could feel Gerard was looking at her and that’s why she felt a little nervous but didn’t show that. “… some Greek citizens believed they owed their lives more to Prometheus than to the gods of Olympus. And some followers even took names to honor the titans instead of gods.”

“Like Deucalion” Scott said, looking at the young Argent.

“The son of Prometheus” Stella confirmed him. She licked her lips and sighed before she continued. Her voice was like a whisper but loud enough for everyone to hear. “Lycaon didn’t just refuse to honor the gods. He challenged them.” She took another breath. Remembering the day that she first found out about this story and it being real was flying around in her brain, but she shut them up as she continued with the myth. “He invited Zeus to a banquet and then tried to serve him the flesh of a human being. Angered, Zeus blew the place apart with lightning bolts and then punished Lycaon and his sons by turning them into wolves.” Stella was flipping through pages as Stella kept telling the story, showing them the pictures. She recognized the book. It was always in his study before. “The part that’s lesser known, and by that I mean the part you can’t find on a Wikipedia search is how Lycaon sought out to druids to help turn him back to human.”

“Why druids?” Scott asked, frowning as his gaze moved from the pictures on the books up to his friend’s thinking face.

Stella softly shrugged. “The belief was that the ancient druids knew how to shape-shift” she responded. “They couldn’t make Lycaon and his sons human again, but they did teach them how to shift back and forth.” While Stella kept her gaze on the open book, Gerard looked at Scott and smiled. However, that wasn’t a very friendly smile at all. Stella opened her lips one more time to finish up the story. “And so, the druids became important advisors to the pack.”

She closed the book while Gerard turned around and sat back on his wheelchair. He grabbed a new napkin from his stash and continued his story about Deucalion. It wasn’t a very thrilling one but was going to help them when they were face to face with their enemy. It would help them win when they were back against Kali, Deucalion, Ethan and… Aiden.

Stella stopped before her thoughts went back to Aiden. Again. For the thousandth time since that night.

As she focused back to her ‘beloved’ grandfather, his voice filled up the room again. She leaned back against the part in front of the window. “I wasn’t really surprised when Deaton came to arrange a meeting with Deucalion” Gerard continued. “As William Blake said-”

Stella interrupted her grandfather, murmuring to herself. “Any sinister person who means to be your enemy always start by trying to become your friend.” Gerard smiled, looking at his granddaughter. She knew he thought that she understood him but the only reason Stella said that was because Aiden popped into her head again. She wasn’t thinking about Deucalion.

Scott looked at her, as Stella licked her lips and trying to avoid any eye contact with any of them. Scott understood what she was thinking about and understood she wasn’t going to make any more comments about it so he looked at Gerard instead with a frown. “How do you know he wasn’t going there to make peace?” he asked, resting his elbows on his knees as he sat on the couch.

“Because I’m not an idiot!” Gerard responded, raising his voice firmly. “Do you know the Sanskrit fable of the scorpion and the turtle?”

Stella flung her hair back as a reaction to another story. She exhaled frustratedly while Scott summarized the whole story. There were one scorpion and a turtle, trying to pass across the bridge. Scorpion suggested that it would carry the turtle, the turtle asked if and how it could trust it. Scorpion said if it did, they would both drown. In the middle of the river, scorpion stung the turtle and when the turtle asked the scorpion why, it said that it’s in its nature.

“I know a werewolves’ nature” Gerard continued after Scott was done with the fable. “I knew exactly what was coming… A trap.” He told them the rest of the story, how Deucalion came, and they met and then how the rest of the meeting went.

“They attacked you?” Allison asked in shock, leaning forward and looking at her grandpa.

“It was an ambush” he confirmed her. Stella frowned, hearing his answer and seeing the smile on his face that made Stella uneasy. She took a deep breath and leaned back with a scowl as she listened the nonsense that her grandpa was telling them about.

She didn’t believe him, even for a second.

Few minutes later, Gerard was done with the story. The trio looked at him, each with different expressions as their reaction. The first one to ask a question was Scott. “He sees as a wolf?” he asked.

“He’s not always blind” Gerard repeated himself, confirming the werewolf.

“Maybe we can use it against him” Allison said as Stella kept her mouth shut. She didn’t believe or even think Deucalion attacked him first. Even when she knew how dangerous that alpha wolf can be. It just wouldn’t make any sense. So, as she tried to fill in the blanks herself, she didn’t say anything. She was just listening to her cousin, to her friend and the silence.

Few seconds later, thinking they got everything they wanted, Allison, Scott and Stella stood up but Gerard stopped them as his arms reached out for Scott again, telling him what to do. Scott nodded, taking a bit more of his pain. 

“Oh, I think about you sometimes, Scott. I do” Gerard said as he looked up at him. When they heard him, Allison and Stella shared a glance. Gerard continued. “I wonder, what if I’d done things differently. Getting the bite to cure my cancer. And I wonder when it became my nature to believe most things couldn’t be asked for but had to be taken.”

“I don’t believe you” Scott said as a response, hearing what Gerard has said. Stella frowned, looking at Scott. She crossed her arms in front of her chest as Scott continued speaking. “The whole time that you were telling your story, I was listening to your heartbeat. It never went up. It never went down. It was steady the whole time.”

“Because I was telling the truth” Gerard protested.

Stella let out a sarcastic scoff. She licked her lips, teasingly grinning as she looked at the old man in the wheelchair. “No, you are just a pretty goddamn liar” Stella said, standing right next to Scott.

Scott leaned in, grabbed Gerard’s hand, and squeezed it real tight, making him squirm in pain. And then, as the pain spread all over Gerard’s body, Stella bit her lip. Meanwhile, Scott parted his lips again. “If you lied and it gets people hurt…” he started. “I’ll be back to take away more than your pain.” He strongly threw Gerard’s hand away from him, leaving him in terror and then he turned back to walk away. As he walked out of the door, Allison remained still and looked at her cousin who was still standing in front of the old man like she had something to say before they go.

Stella walked towards Gerard who was still in shock with pain, holding his hand. “You know…” she said, not carrying any emotion on her face nor in her voice. “If I were you, I’d be grateful for Scott.” She paused for a second. “Before I went to France…” Stella couldn’t help the grin as she said two words. “Mountain Ash.” Hearing that, Allison raised her eyebrows while Gerard looked pretty surprised. “I knew you were just up to something. I knew you had a sick plan. You messed with the person I love, Gerard. I knew that. I knew what you were going to do after losing me, who was going to be your next victim… because I knew you. So, I called Scott. I told him to kill you. I gave him the plan. But he chose to save your life. That’s something to be grateful about. Don’t you think?”

Without giving him a chance to speak, react or even do anything, Stella straightened up and walked out of the room with Allison and Scott. The sound of the door closing shut behind them echoed in the air and ringed in Gerard’s ears for a long time.


	9. THE GIRLS WHO KNEW TOO MUCH

Stella watched Stiles park his blue jeep next to her black car on the parking lot with her hands shaking like crazy. She pressed them together, thinking maybe it would stop the shaking but it didn’t. Her heart was beating crazy while she could feel Allison’s worried gaze upon her. And not just on her but on Lydia as well. They were the reason why they were at the school this late. Both felt the same thing.

As Lydia and Stella exchanged a look between them, Scott quickly took off his helmet and he hung it on its bike. He turned to Scott. None of them spotted the girls yet so he opened his mouth to ask a question. “Where are they?” Stiles asked, looking at Scott with a worried look on his face. Allison shouted at them, making Scott and Stiles turn to look at their direction quickly. The boys quickly walked up to them as Stella moved on her spot nervously. They stood in front of them and then Stiles’ hazel eyes and Scott’s brown eyes turned to the young Argent. “Stella?” Stiles said, looking at her as he was encouraging her to tell them what happened.

“I…” Stella sighed as she licked her lips nervously, feeling like her heart was about to burst out of her chest. She looked around, at her cousin but then looked back at the boys. “It was the same thing as the party, exactly what I felt when I walked into the basement.” She was nervous as she softly sighed. She looked at Allison to get enough strength to continue. Then her gaze moved back to Stiles and Scott. “When we left the house, we were planning to go somewhere completely different. I mean…” She pointed the school that they were standing in the yard of before she continued. “But we found ourselves here.”

Lydia nodded quickly as Stiles and Scott started looking at her. Allison reached for Stella’s hands to give her some support, holding her hand tight. “Same thing” she told them. “Same thing as the pool. Just like Stella, I got in the car heading completely somewhere different, and ended up here.” She paused to take a breath. “And you told me to call you if there’s a dead body.”

“You found a dead body?” Stiles asked with a loud voice looking back and forth between Stella and Lydia.

“Not yet” Lydia answered.

“Not yet?” Stiles repeated heatedly in disbelief. “What do you mean not yet? Lydia, you’re supposed to call us _after_ you find the dead body!” Stella rolled her eyes, thinking he was always overreacting. And even more when he quickly turned towards her. “Have you found the dead body?”

Stella parted her lips, looking at Stiles in disbelief and then they all heard Lydia, talking for the both of them. “Uh, no. We are not doing that again” she said, shaking her finger to Stiles’ face. “You find the dead body from now on.”

“How are we supposed to find the dead body?” Stiles responded, opening his hands to his sides in disbelief. “You two are the ones who always find the dead body.”

“Guys” Scott yelled out, intervening their conversation. Stella rolled her eyes at Stiles once again while Scott continued. Hearing his voice and following his eyes, they all looked at the direction Scott was focused on. That’s when Lydia held her breath and Stella gasped. There was a lifeless cop laying on the sign of Beacon Hills High School covered in blood and dripping on the sign and then onto the ground. Scott parted his lips to announce while their wide-open eyes were focused on the cop in shock. “I found the dead body.”

The next day at school, Stella was with Stiles when they saw his dad in the hallways as he was talking to the others. Stiles immediately started spying on him, trying to hear what he was saying or read his lips and Stella stayed with him as they started watching his dad with no reason at all. Actually, Stella knew Stiles had his own reasons like watching his dad and making sure he was okay as well as learning what they were up to and if he needed any help and also to find out what was his guess in all this. He was there to see they had any news on the dead cop they found last night.

And for Stella, she also had reasons on her own.

Stella needed a distraction, she needed to clear her mind. She was the only Argent in the school today after Allison decided to stay home. That’s what she told to Chris, anyway. Stella knew she was up to something, and she had a plan. She asked her to be a part of it, but Stella thought it was better for her to just go to school. Her uncle asked if she was sure, but Stella knew if she’d stayed home or even helped her cousin out with the whole supernatural stuff, she’d lose it. She decided to go to school.

She just needed that one, normal school day for once. She needed a normal day and it was actually going well for the moment, even with the thought of last because she hasn’t seen Aiden yet, which felt like a win.

She had no idea why she was reacting to the situation the way she was. Was it because he killed Boyd who grown to be one of her close friends? Or because she saw something in Aiden and when he helped killed Boyd, she thought it was just gone forever?

Stella hated the way her mind was going or working.

But thankfully, she managed to snap out of her thoughts when she heard Sheriff and noticed he was walking towards them as he pointed them. She saw the way Stiles used his bag to cover himself next to her and held herself not to roll her eyes. She turned around just like Stiles and prepared for their run but stopped as they heard Sheriff again.

“Hey, hey, hey! Back it up” he shouted at them, walking towards them. Stella wrinkled up her nose and Stiles put down his bag as they turned around again and looked at the Sheriff. “I know what you’re thinking” Sheriff continued, looking at his son and the Argent. “I know you’ve got all these ideas about patterns and people dying in threes…”

“Dad, murdered, okay? Sacrificed, actually” Stiles explained heatedly, raising his voice up a little bit but Stella didn’t think Sheriff was listening or that he cared because he didn’t know everything. He was looking through a window of making sense, not supernatural.

“I’ve got half the state, including the FBI, coming in on this” he told him. “They’re not getting away with killing one of our own.” Sheriff’s voice was calm, unlike his son Stiles. Stella felt like a third wheel to their father-son duo at the moment, but she couldn’t leave Stiles yet. Actually, she would and she definitely could but she wasn’t going to. She promised Stiles that they’d do this together and lately, they were actually getting along pretty well.

At least no one was getting angry when Stella called him Stilinski and Stiles called her The Other Argent to mess with her.

“Dad, they killed Tara” Stiles said softly, lowering his voice. Now he was sad, thinking about the deputy that he knew for almost his whole life. “You know, how many times did she help me with my math homework when I had to wait at the station for you?”

Stella let out a quiet but angry yet silent breath. She wanted to find that Darach, dark druid or whatever that was and kill it with her bare hands. First it tried to kill Scott, Isaac, Boyd and even Ethan and then attacked Danny and then like it wasn’t enough, it tried to sacrifice Deaton.

And to be honest, Stella wasn’t very good with her anger management to calm herself down about this.

Sheriff looked back and forth between Stella and Stiles, not knowing what to do or say after hearing what his son said and the emotion behind it. “Just, uh, get to class you two, okay?” he told them and then walked back to the guys he was talking to before he spotted them.

Stella sighed as she turned to look at Stiles. “Sooner or later, you’re gonna have to tell him the whole truth” she softly murmured. “He’s not seeing the whole board.” Hearing Stella’s words, Stiles’ brown eyes found her face and he pressed his lips together. Stella continued. “You don’t want him to get hurt and believe me, I don’t want him to get hurt either, but… he has to know, Stiles. Only then he can protect himself and the people around him.”

“Yeah” Stiles murmured. Out of the corner of his eyes, he found his dad again. “I know.”

“C’mon” Stella whispered to him, pointing the hallway with her head. Stiles turned to her, took a deep breath and then they started walking to their class.

“Idioms, analogies, metaphors, and similes…” Stella looked at the drawing she’s been working on while hearing Ms. Blake’s voice in the back. She listened to her but her eyes moved on the thin and black lines. It didn’t look like much. It definitely looked like a tree but as she noticed something, she found herself frowning in confusion, felt spooked for a second as she realized it was the same tree, same looking tree that Lydia’s been drawing as well. Stella tilted her head while looking down on her notebook. She didn’t realize Ms. Blake was walking between Lydia and Stella’s desks as she continued her lecture. “… All tools the writer uses to tell their stories.” Ms. Blake looked around and then saw that Lydia was drawing something on her notebook, instead of listening to the class. “Lydia,” she said to get her attention. “I wasn’t aware you had so many hidden talents.” 

Hearing her voice and the things she’s said, Stella quickly closed her notebook and straightened up her back while Lydia just smiled and looked up at Ms. Blake. “You and every guy I’ve ever dated” she commented, making Stella to press her lips together not to laugh or chuckle at her reaction. 

Ms. Blake cleared her throat nervously. “Oh, um, well, that was an idiom, by the way” she stammered. She put a smile on her face, looked at Stella for a second. Her eyes drifted to the closed notebook in front of her on her desk, causing Stella to frown with the sudden mood change but then Ms. Blake kept talking about whatever the hell she was talking about and moved on. Lydia continued drawing but Stella followed the teacher with her eyes. “Idioms are something of a secret to the people who know the language or the culture.” As she continued with the class, walking on the aisles between the desks, her eyes were moving on the students. First it was Scott and then Stiles and then others and then Stella. She noticed the way it lingered on her more but before she could find a meaning to it, Ms. Blake moved on. She exhaled, opened her notebook to look at her drawing when Ms. Blake was finally away from her. The drawing definitely reminded her of something, but she didn’t know what it was, causing her to frown in mental frustration. “They’re phrases that only makes sense if you know the key words. Saying ‘jump the gun’ is meaningful only if you know about the starting gun in a race, or a phrase like ‘seeing the whole board’.” 

“Like chess” Stiles murmured, causing Ms. Blake’s eyes to find him.

“That’s right, Stiles” Ms. Blake said with a soft smile on her face, looking at him. “Do you play?”

“Uh, no, my father does” he responded as he was playing with his fingers nervously, remembering what Stella said to him earlier about his father not seeing the whole board. 

Ms. Blake turned back to class and continued to talk about today’s topic. Seeing her attention drifting away from them, Scott quickly leaned in towards Stiles and caused the girls to look at them as well. “I think I can get to Ethan” he murmured, keeping his voice low so that the others in the class wouldn’t heard him. Stella knotted her eyebrows in curiosity, waited for Scott to continue. “I’m pretty sure I can make him talk.”

Now, Stella was definitely confused. “Okay, first of all, what gives you the idea that Ethan will talk at all?” she asked, raising her eyebrows and looking directly at Scott, keeping her voice down just like Scott. She didn’t wait for him to answer before she asked another question. “And second of all… why do you want to do that for?”

“I don’t know” Scott answered with a shrug, looking at Stella who was sitting at the desk behind him. He softly and slowly turned back to look at her. “But I was just thinking. Druids are emissaries, right?” He looked back and forth between Stella, Stiles and Lydia. “So, what if the Darach was an emissary to the alphas?”

“Okay, first of all, I cannot believe that we’ve gotten to the point where a sentence like ‘What if the Darach was emissary to the alphas?’ actually makes sense to me” Stiles reacted, blinking his eyes in disbelief that it took them this long to come up with this logic. “Second of all, we’re gonna have a huge problem getting to Ethan.”

“What’s that?” Scott asked.

“Getting through Aiden” Stiles answered.

Stella tightened every muscle of her body when she heard the name. She didn’t know if she managed not to react to it but at this point, she didn’t have the strength to care at all. She had no idea why she was like this towards this situation. Long time ago, she trapped every feeling and tossed it far away from her. It was hard for Stella to know which emotion was which. Which ones were healthy and which ones were not… She didn’t have a clue. Allison was the only one she used the ‘I love you’ phrase to… She was the only one. There was no one else. Not even her grandparents who looked after her for the longest time, her mother who gave birth to her and her uncle who was always there for here even though they didn’t see each other for a very long time. It was only Allison and she was happy and peaceful like that but right now? She didn’t know and honestly, she didn’t want to know.

She focused on the drawing in front of her instead of thinking about Aiden or hearing Stiles and Scott. It was actually pretty easy to do. She shut everyone and every conversation down until it was all just a white noise machine that faded in the background and kept drawing.

Until she realized there was actually a silent and felt three pairs of eyes on herself. She pressed her lips together, curled her hand into a fist and looked at Lydia, Scott and Stiles. “What?” she asked in annoyance. She knew, she wasn’t going to like what she had to hear, what was coming for her.

And she was right.

Stiles and Scott told her about their plan, causing she to sigh. “No” Stella said without a break, too seriously. “I promised Derek something and I am willing to keep that promise. Not because of Derek but because of what Aiden did.” Her shoulders dropped and as she sighed again, she looked at Scott and Stiles who were looking at her with expectations. “I can’t do it. I can’t! He’d know something is up. He saw the way I didn’t look at him the night he killed Boyd. He won’t believe me.”

Scott and Stiles looked at each other, not knowing what to do. They needed to talk to Ethan but they knew the only way to keep Aiden away from him was Stella. Scott and Stiles paused, trying to figure out what to say to her to get her onboard. They had nothing but thankfully Lydia knew how to persuade Stella in terms like these. “Look, sweetie” she innocently started. “I know, okay? I get you and I know it’s hard for you but-”

Stella interrupted her. “It’s not hard for me” she said, not seeing what Lydia was doing. “I just...” She gulped down as she licked her lips frustratedly. “I just don’t want to see him because he killed my friend. That’s it.” Her voice was sharp, determined but Lydia knew she already let her guard down because she knew Stella hated to be seen weak or any kind of emotional.

“If it’s not hard for you, then you can distract your mind for a bit” Lydia said. “Just long enough for these dumbasses to talk to Ethan.” They kept looking at her while Stella let out a deep and sharp breath. She looked at her friends which felt like a lifetime but then nodded in defeat, exhaling.

They had to find who Darach was so if she had to distract Aiden for a while for them to talk to Ethan and get something out of it, then she could do it.

Hopefully, she couldn’t help but thought as her eyes drifted away.

When the class was dismissed with the bell and Stella walked to their usual place, Aiden was already there waiting for her. Stella gulped as she saw him, her heart beating fast. After being convinced to do this, she texted Aiden to meet her here and one part of her just wished that he wouldn’t come.

But he was here, looking at her, surprised that she even texted at all.

“Thought you’d never come” Stella murmured as she walked in and closed the door behind her. She locked it so that no one would come in and took few steps towards Aiden who was nervous as well but trying to hide it just like Stella. He was similarly better than her.

“Thought you’d never text at all” Aiden responded. Stella shrugged as she was trying to get rid of the images of Aiden holding Derek’s arms and Kali dropping Boyd onto Derek’s claws. She took another step towards him before she put her hand on the back of Aiden’s neck and pulled his body to herself. She quickly placed her lips on his, started kissing him.

Aiden, shocked by the gesture, immediately kissed her back as he put one of his hands on her cheek and the other one on her waist. Stella pushed Aiden’s body, making him sit on the table. Her hands moved down to the sleeve of his shirt to pull it off, but stopped as she noticed the way Aiden was looking at her with a confused frown.

Stella pulled back immediately, knotting her eyebrows. “What’s that look for?” she asked curiously, finally pulling the emotionless self forward.

Aiden suddenly remembered what he talked with his brother earlier as he kept looking at Stella’s brown eyes. He asked him if he would kill Danny if Deucalion asked him too and then threatened him if he kept seeing him because he knew Stella and Lydia were the ones they should be worrying about. He was thankful that he didn’t ask him the same question because as he looked at Stella, he wasn’t sure what his answer would be or the fact that he had the strength in him to tell the answer he felt it was true.

Aiden softly shook his head, looking at her. He tried to get rid of the thoughts of his own question to his brother, parting his lips to answer Stella’s question to him. “Nothing” he said and then continued. “I’m just kind of surprised. You’ve barely talked to me since…”

“Since what?” Stella asked, feeling the anger rising inside her but not letting it out completely. She could feel her mask going down and it was not good. Beacon Hills was not good. Ever since she came here, she felt so many emotions. Love, support, hate, anger, friendship… And she hated everything. Even the good ones. “Since you killed Boyd?”

“I told you that was Kali” Aiden explained again. Stella remembered the text messages he sent her after that day that she didn’t reply to.

“I was there, Aiden” Stella said, trying to keep a straight face. Her fingers were still holding the sleeves of his shirt for a reason but she didn’t pull them away. “I saw what happened.”

Aiden sighed, looked at her. “Then you saw that I didn’t have much of a choice” he responded.

“I thought you were all alphas” Stella whispered, leaning towards him. She knew Aiden was getting angry as well and he was trying to control it, but she didn’t really care. All she cared about was that he killed one of her friends.

“Yeah, well, it’s not as democratic as it sounds” he said. Aiden’s voice was sharp but low just like Stella’s when she was talking. “And if you’re thinking I should be all filled with remorse, try and remember Derek killed Ennis.”

“So, we are back to fifth grade?” Stella said with a scoff, raising her eyebrows sarcastically. “It’s his turn to kill someone now, is that it?”

“Maybe” Aiden answered. His level of sarcasm and annoyance was the same as Stella’s. “Maybe like the time he and Isaac tried to kill Lydia.”

“How’d you know about that?” Stella pulled herself back away from him and this time with her hands as well. She watched his lips curl into a grin but before he could answer or say anything at all, they were distracted with an itching sound. Stella startled as both of their heads turned towards the door. There were no shadows but a spiral drawing on the steamy window of the door. Stella could swear she has never seen something like that before. “What is that?” she couldn’t help but ask.

Aiden exhaled angrily through his nose as he answered her. “Derek.”

“Derek!” Aiden yelled out, walking out of the room. Stella immediately knew it wasn’t going to end well and went after him while trying to stop him. She felt overwhelmed with everything that’s been going on. She had no idea what could she do if it was actually Derek like he said, even though Stella didn’t think it was him, knowing he was a dumbass but not reckless. She had no idea what she could do if they were to start a fight in school. 

“Aiden, stop, please!” she practically begged, her voice breaking. Aiden was getting angry and she had no weapons whatsoever that she could use on him to knock him out. She took a deep breath, looked around and then back at Aiden who kept walking, ignoring Stella’s hands around his arm. “Please, stop!”

“You want to fight, Derek?” Aiden yelled out again. “Come and get me!” That’s when a brunette came out from nowhere, the aisle next to them and pushed Aiden to the grey lockers. Stella stepped back with reflex and immediately recognized who it was, seeing the hair and the movement, feeling the anger. It was Cora.

Stella felt relaxed by the fact that it wasn’t Derek but then tensed up again when she realized that Cora was angrier, more violent.

She grew her claws out and scratched Aiden’s chest. Stella looked around, trying to figure out what to do, how to stop them. As they kept fighting viciously, Stella tried to think to herself about what she could do. She didn’t have her gun with her or Chinese daggers. She left them in her locker before class today. She had two very angry werewolves who were trying to kill each other right now but no weapons. She might have been a hunter but she was still a human. And she hated the fact that there was nothing she could do but sit back and watch.

She completely hated that.

Aiden glowed his red eyes and roared at the angry Hale. Right when Cora was about to claw him again, he held her hand tightly away from his body. He stilled her hand back as the other hand grabbed her by the throat and then threw her across the room.

“Aiden!” Stella screamed out of her control when she saw Cora hit her head pretty hard to the lockers. Aiden ignored Stella and grabbed one of the really heavy barbells in the gym of the school and pulled it up to threw it to Cora. Stella quickly ran to him and held his biceps without thinking. “Aiden, stop! Please, just stop! Stop!” she screamed again but it didn’t stop Aiden. He was raged. He couldn’t see straight.

He tried push her hand away with a growl but that only made the barbell to hit her hand very hard.

Pain radiated through her body instantly as she was thrown away by the strength Aiden used to push her. She hit her back against the lockers. She shut her eyes and grimaced with the pain and fell down onto the ground. Her hand covered her wrist that already turned purple. She kept her eyes closed as she sucked breath between her teeth and then moaned in pain. Then she heard the sound of the barbell hitting Cora. Her painful moan followed that sound, causing Stella to ignore her pain on her wrist and on her back. She tried pull herself up. Because that was what she was supposed to do as an Argent. _Fight through the pain_ … That’s what she was taught ever since she was a little kid, as far as she could remember.

She heard the sound when Cora fell down. That’s also when two people came barging in and grabbed Aiden by the arm, pulling him away so that he couldn’t attack again. Stiles immediately ran to Stella, not noticing Cora yet. “Oh, my God!” he screamed when he saw the shape of her wrist. He looked at her with a worried look on his face. “Are you okay? Does it hurt?” Stella nodded, trying to show him that she was okay. She couldn’t bear to say something because if she did, he’d notice how much of a pain she was in.

“Cora” she whispered, pointing her. She was still holding and squeezing her wrist to ease the pain, but it didn’t seem to work. “Go check on her.”

Stiles ran to Cora, not believing Stella that she was fine for a second but noticing Cora was worse. The sound of barbell hitting the ground, echoed in the empty room, making Stella to look at Aiden who was being held back by Ethan and Scott.

“You can’t do this!” Ethan shouted at his twin.

“She came at me!” Aiden shouted back as a response. His fangs were still out, his eyes were still glowing red as he was still angry.

“It doesn’t matter!” Ethan was pretty angry, too but he was angry with his twin who wouldn’t listen to any of them. With the help of Scott, he kept holding him back as he continued. “Kali gave Derek time until the next full Moon. You can’t touch him or her!” He shook his twin one more time to put some sense into him. Aiden looked at Ethan when he continued with something that he knew that will calm him down even though Aiden wouldn’t admit it. “You even hurt Stella! It’s Stella, Aiden!” Hearing that, just like Ethan predicted it, Aiden transformed back to human. His brown eyes moved to Stella who was still on her knees with her hand wrapped around her wrist. Her eyes were on Cora and Stiles but Aiden could see how much pain she was in just by the tensed muscles on her face.

When Stella felt Aiden’s gaze on her, she stopped looking at Cora and looked back at him for a brief second before she turned to Ethan with anger and another feeling in her voice. Disappointment? Frustration? Maybe a combination of both… “Get him out of here” she mouthed; her eyes focused on Ethan. She definitely didn’t want to see Aiden now. She couldn’t even look at him and he had to leave before he hurt someone else.

Ethan agreed with her.

He forcefully escorted Aiden out of the gym while he was still looking at her. The minute they were gone, Scott walked over to Stella. Stiles was looking Cora, trying to see if she was okay while Scott looked at Stella and held her hand tight between his hands. Stella startled with the sudden pain, but as soon as the black veins appeared on Scott’s hand moving up, she relaxed and let out a soft breath, happy that the most of the pain was gone. “Thank you” she softly and sadly whispered.

“I don’t think it’s broken” he said, looking her in the eye. He let go of Stella’s hand as he felt a little bit guilty since they were the ones who wanted and forced her to distract Aiden and put her through this even though they figured out something from Ethan and they knew more than before now. They knew that Darach wasn’t their emissary because everyone in their previous packs were dead, Ennis’ and Kali’s included. There was only one emissary left and it was Morell, Deaton’s sister who was a part of Deucalion’s pack. Scott exhaled and kept looking at Stella as he continued. “But you should see a doctor anyway.”

Stella nodded, knowing she wasn’t going to doctor. Thankfully, Scott didn’t stop on it too much because they all looked Cora when they heard Stiles. “Hey, guys” he called out to them. He was pretty worried and he had every right to be. There was blood coming out of Cora’s forehead and her eyes were still closed as he announced. “I think she’s pretty hurt.”

When Cora was finally back on her feet, she looked in the mirror and tried to clean the blood on her forehead. It was obviously hurting her but Stella, herself, was in too much pain to care about or focus on anything else. Scott may have taken her pain, but it was certainly coming back, and she was definitely not going to the doctor.

“You okay?” Stiles asked, looking at the young Hale.

“She doesn’t look okay” Stella commented, not even thinking about it because Cora looked like shit, and everyone knew that.

Cora rolled her eyes while still facing the mirror and looked at Stella through it. “I’ll heal” Cora sharply said. She put the dirty and bloody tissue in the sink and took few steps back but as soon as she let go off the support she was using to stand, she stumbled. Stiles and Scott quickly held her up, keeping her on her feet but Cora, being her usual stubborn self, raised her hand refused any help. “I said I’m fine.”

Stella moved her eyebrows and slowly let go off her own hand which was now officially purple and probably getting worse. “Oh, you’re definitely fine, pal” she mocked Cora, causing her to look at Stella with the signature Hale death glares. If the looks were to kill people, Stella would die on spot but that also easily could be Cora’s usual look as well.

It was hard to tell.

“Do you realize how suicidally crazy that was?” Stiles asked, raising his eyebrows, looking at Cora. “What were you thinking going after them?”

“I did it for Boyd” Cora yelled as it was her response to his question. Stella tried to gulp down, hearing her voice shatter in pain but due to the numb in her throat, she just couldn’t. “None of you were doing anything.” She directly looked at Stella. “Except for throwing yourselves into the arms of the killers.”

Stella pressed her lips, not having much to say to that. She was right. Even though it was to distract and lure Aiden away from Ethan, she was back with him for a second. 

Scott looked at Core with an innocent puppy face. “We’re trying” he said.

“And you’re failing” Cora snapped back with anger. “You’re just a bunch of stupid teenagers running around, thinking that you can stop people from getting killed.” Scott looked at her friends while Stella and Stiles looked down at their feet. “But all you do is show up late. All you really do is find bodies.”

As she walked away without saying anything else that hit them, Stiles softly nodded. “She’s definitely a Hale” he murmured, scratching the side of his eyebrow. “I’ll make sure she gets home.”

Stella let out a breath as Stiles walked away after Cora and looked at Scott. “I’m going to find Lydia” she announced. “I have to kill her for ever convincing me into distracting that bastard.”

She was wandering around in the campus when she heard the scream in the back of her head and, thankfully, managed not to scream. She stopped on her spot, shut her eyes, squeezing every muscle on her face. When the scream stopped, she opened her eyes back and looked around as she brushed her hair away from her face.

The next thing she knew she was running towards the school while she was trying to find Lydia.

And she did find her few minutes later. She was standing in the history class, in front of the dark board with a chalk between her fingers. There was a Celtic symbol of five-fold knot drawn on the board and the number 2 in one of them, probably written by Lydia.

She stepped inside the class, her eyes moving on the board to Lydia who turned to her with fear in her eyes, not knowing what happened to her.

Before people crowded the room, Aiden was the first one to come into the class, hearing the scream and seeing Stella’s worried face in the campus yard. He walked up to the Argent, softly touched her hand, asked if she was okay while taking some of her pain away. Stella looked at him, softly frowning but then remembered the situation and the things went down between them not too long ago, she put her hands into her pockets and sat on one of the desks, looking back at Lydia.

“I don’t get why no one’s calling the police” Lydia questioned, looking at Ms. Blake. Her hair was messier, she looked spaced for a situation like this, so Stella figured Derek was in the school lot, paying her a little visit when they called her in.

“They’re going to make an announcement through P.A.” Ms. Blake said but Lydia quickly interrupted her before she could say more.

“That’s not gonna do anything!” she yelled. “I told you, he’s gone. Like others, taken.” Her voice faded away towards the end of the sentence. While Ms. Blake sighed and slightly nodded, Scott walked past the students, but the security didn’t let him go any further. He was stopped before he could step inside. 

“Look, we’re just trying to understand, okay?” Ms. Blake said, trying to calm Lydia down. “All we know is that Mr. Westover didn’t show up for class.”

Stella raised one eyebrow as she looked at Ms. Blake with a mocking glance. “And the last time that happened was Mr. Harris” she reminded her. “Anyone heard from him lately?” She leaned her head back softly as she kept looking at the woman with a little bit of sarcasm. “He’s gone, and you know it.”

Lydia nodded and walked over to the board. “And Mr. Westover is going to be the second murder” Lydia added, pointing the written number 2 on the board. Meanwhile, Aiden softly held Stella’s arm and Stella, somehow, for some reason, didn’t do anything to pull away. As she questioned herself with a scowl, she gulped down. She tried to focus back as she heard Ms. Blake.

“But Lydia, you wrote that number” she told her softly.

“Okay, fine” Lydia responded, giving in. “I’m psychic.” Hearing that, Stella frowned. She forgot about Aiden and everything and just looked at Lydia. A psychic?

“You’re psychic?” Ms. Blake asked, raising her eyebrows in disbelief.

“I’m something!” she shouted, making everyone to look at her. Lydia looked around, not knowing what to say or do when she saw Scott. Meanwhile Stella grabbed her lip between her teeth and looked down at her hands. She could hear Scott and Ethan talking in the back and she could feel Aiden was looking at her with a concerned look.

“A deputy and a teacher?” Ethan asked, trying to make it make sense in his mind. Stella remembered Allison’s text from half an hour ago. Isaac and she figured out about the threes and what they were supposed to be. Virgins, warriors, healers, philosophers and guardians… So, it was only natural for Ethan to be confused. “What’s the pattern?”

Stella looked back at the Celtic symbol on the board as she thought about these 5 patterns, meanwhile Scott sighed and answered Ethan. “I don’t know.”

***********

“I had it!” Chris’ voice echoed over the phone, making Stella to roll her eyes. After giving the bad news to Stella, which was the fact that they’ve found Mr. Westover dead, Chris finally came clean and told them about his plan and the whole mysterious act about his study. It was what Allison was working out to find out, to learn what he was hiding in there.

Apparently, he was following the Darach the whole time.

Stella scowled, walking around in the school. Scott, she and the others were at school to watch the recital and keep another teacher from dying because Darach was targeting teachers as philosophers and at the moment, every teacher was at the recital and they were all potential targets.

“So what? It’s our fault?” Stella asked in disbelief. Her voice went up a little higher than she meant to. She knew she was on speaker and she knew Isaac was there too, listening her like Chris and Allison. “You’ve been lying to us for over two months now.”

Chris looked at Allison who had the same angry expression as Stella at the moment. “You wanna tally up the lies, girls?” he talked to the phone angrily. Stella rolled her eyes. “I don’t think any of you are going to come out ahead on this one.”

“Hey, uhm, just a thought” Isaac said, interrupting as they were still in the place that they found their history teacher. There was no one else but still had a very serious situation in their hands so they needed to focus. “Maybe right now isn’t the best time for a little family meeting. I mean, there’s still one more teacher.”

“The recital” Chris murmured, agreeing with Isaac.

Stella brushed her hair back with her empty hand. It ached, causing her to wince but pulled herself together really quickly. “I am at the school right now” she said, letting out a breath from her nose. “I’ll stay and look around.”

Chris looked at Allison and Isaac. “We’ll be there as soon as we can, okay?” he responded. Stella whispered something to confirm him and as they ended the call, Stella cursed out, putting her phone back in her pocket.

“Stella!” She rolled her eyes, hearing Aiden’s voice behind her and as she took a deep breath, she kept walking. Noticing that, Aiden started walking faster and tried to catch up with her, knowing why she was ignoring him. “Stella, can you hear me out for a second?” She closed her eyes, stopping on her spot and as she opened her eyes back, she turned around to look at Aiden’s concerned look that she had no idea what it was for. Okay, she was confused with her actions, but his actions were a lot more concerning and confusing than her own. As she looked at him, she raised her eyebrows. She waited for him to talk. “You okay?” was the first question to leave his lips.

Stella couldn’t help her sarcastic scoff. “Oh, I am super freaking fantastic” she answered Aiden. The level of sarcasm and annoyance and frustration in her voice was out of this world. “Why would I feel bad or, I don’t know, defeated when people around us keep dropping dead and Darach still out there trying to pick its next victim?” She forced a fake yet angry smile on her face and looked directly into Aiden’s brown eyes. “I am not you, am I?”

“Stella” Aiden said, trying to calm her down but obviously, he wasn’t very successful at it.

“Aiden” Stella said, interrupting him with a sharper voice. Her mask was up back to her face. She was grateful for that. “Maybe you don’t care about the school and the only reason you are here is because your big bad alpha glued you on my and Lydia’s ass and he wants you to be closer to Scott and eliminate the threats, but I do care. Maybe it doesn’t look like it. Maybe I look like an emotionless son of a bitch to you or anyone else around, but I honestly care. I care about the school. I care about the students and the teachers inside it. I don’t want to watch people die. I don’t want to keep doing that.” She stopped, shook her head softly, slightly. “I’ve ran enough last year. I am not going to run again. Not this time. But I…” She stopped, closing her eyes and taking a deep breath. When she opened them back, she was more controlled and calmer. As Aiden kept watching and listening to her, he had no idea what to do. Meanwhile Stella was confused enough about why she was, all of sudden, an emotional wreck and why was she like that whenever she was around Aiden. “My uncle, Allison and Isaac found Mr. Westover’s dead body and another teacher in this goddamn school is in danger and for once in my life, I want to feel it before something happens. I want to feel it before I find the dead freaking body. I want to stop it before something happens. For once in my life.”

Aiden looked around, not knowing what to do and then looked at Stella and then traced it to Stella’s bandaged wrist. “How is your wrist?” he asked concernedly. After wrapping it with bandage herself, she completely forgot about it but now that he mentioned it, she could feel the soft ache again. “Did you go to the doctor?”

“I’m fine” Stella answered Aiden, completely ignoring the doctor question because obviously she didn’t go to the doctor. As Stella looked around and got ready to walk away, she startled when, suddenly, Aiden reached out for her hand and wrapped it around with his fingers and then the black veins appeared on his hand, moving up. After a while, Stella pulled her hand to herself and as she softly yet sarcastically chuckled, she looked at Aiden’s face. “You are done maiming, and now trying to heal?” She scoffed, tilting her head to the side. “Don’t bother.”

And then walked away to the school to find an empty class that she wouldn’t be hearing the recital or anyone at all in. She just needed a moment.

It was silent for a while so when Stella heard the noise, it was pretty loud. She quickly turned her head to the door, to the direction she heard the sound from. “Stella” the voice said again, causing Stella to stand up and the took a deep breath with the familiarity of the voice that’s been calling out her name. She started walking towards to the door with slow steps. She grabbed the cold metal handle of the door and then pushed the door open, only to see the black room, instead of the school’s hallways.

She walked few steps forwards, hearing the door shutting behind her loudly. The sound echoed inside her brain.

It was a dark room, except for one door which was bright white. The same as before… Stella’s heart rates went wild as she was looking around and then she heard the voice again. That voice that was calling her name over and over again… The voice that belonged to the hallucination that ended up with Stella leaving Beacon Hills last year…

“Stella!” the voice screamed again. Stella fought her urge to scream. She wanted to, no, she needed to… She had to find out who that voice belonged to.

“Who are you?” she screamed back, forcing herself. It was hard to block the scream that was inside her lungs that wanted to be free. But she managed to do so. “Who the hell are you? What is this?” Her voice shattered, full of fear. “What the hell do you want?!”

“You know who I am Stella” the voice answered. Stella listened carefully this time. It sounded like it was coming from a woman who was probably in her 30s, 40s at most. Stella started thinking. Who could it be?

Then the answer popped in her head. “Talia Hale” she murmured. She had no idea how she knew but the minute that name left her lips, she was sure of it. 

“Yes” she said, confirming her and then she appeared in front of her. She was wearing a long dress; her brown hair was down on her shoulder. Her eyes were glowing with a dark shade of the color red and hands were covered with blood but not all of them. It was mostly on the parts where it supposed to have her claws. Stella later noticed that they were gone. Talia continued talking with a sharp but soft voice. Stella didn’t know how she managed to do that but found herself listening to the woman. “Hear what I say.” Alpha paused to make sure that Stella was really listening. “If you want to control them, you have to embrace your powers.”

Stella scoffed frustratedly. “Can we talk about this after you have superpowers while being an Argent?” she responded to her.

Talia softly smiled. “I know, sweetheart but you have to listen to me.” Stella knotted her eyebrows as she did and Talia continued. “I know what you’ve talked with Peter and he’s telling you the truth.” Stella held her breath, parting her lips but nothing came out. “You’ll have to accept and embrace these powers in the future, Stella. That’s how you’re gonna be able to deal with them. That’s how you’re gonna be able to control them.” And then the room they were in started shaken up like an earthquake. Talia ignored it and she kept talking while Stella looked around. When her eyes were back on her, she could swear that Talia was smiling but she wasn’t sure. “Don’t blame yourself, sweetheart” Talia softly told her, causing her to frown more in confusion. “What you did was not your fault. And what’s going to happen is not your fault either.” After saying that, she turned around went through the door, disappeared into the light.

“What the hell?” Stella murmured to herself and ran after her calling out her name. She stood in front of the door Talia walked out, and she reached out for the handle.

She opened the door and screamed as loud as she could. 

When she opened her eyes back, she found herself in a class. Lydia was tied up to a chair across her and Ms. Blake was standing behind her with a rope that was around Lydia’s throat. Stella saw the strangling marks on Lydia’s neck and the tears in her eyes.

But then before even she could react, with one finger movement of Ms. Blake, she flew to another chair. The ropes rolled up around her hands and her lungs, causing her to wince when another round of pain on her wrist hit her.

Stella blinked few times to focus her vision. When she could see clearly again, she noticed the way Ms. Blake was looking at them with a smile. She straightened her back, parting her lips before she talked. “Unbelievable” she said in disbelief. Lydia was shallowly and deeply breathing, tears rolling down from her eyes due to the scream she and Stella let out at the same time not too long ago. Meanwhile Stella looked at Ms. Blake in shock as she understood what was happening. She couldn’t believe the Darach was her the whole time. “You both have no idea what you are, do you?” Stella wanted to make a sarcastic comment. She wanted to be the annoying, brave, fearless, strong girl that she was in New York but ever since she came back to Beacon Hills, ever since she had that first hallucination, she knew deep down that, that girl was long gone and she was never going to come back. Her lips started shaking as the woman kept talking. “The wailing women.” She was looking back and forth between Stella and Lydia. “Not one but two banshees right before my eyes. Two banshees that completes one and other…” She chuckled in disbelief. “That did not happen for a very long time but now here you are.” She took a deep breath. “You’re just like me girls. Look like the innocent flowers, but to be serpents under them.” Lydia was looking at Ms. Blake through her tears as Stella was looking around, trying to come up a plan but she was also listening to her, wondering what she had to say. “It’s too bad, though. And it’s too late.”

As she taped Lydia’s hands, Stella knew what Ms. Blake was going to. She looked at her and opened her mouth in fear. “Stop!” she screamed. “Please stop!” Ms. Blake walked over to Lydia and stood behind her and grabbed the rope again as she looked at Stella who was trying to get rid of her ropes and looking at her psychopath English teacher.

Not a day went by that this school had a normal teacher.

“Don’t worry Stella” Ms. Blake said as she started to smile. “You are going to join her soon enough. Just not as a sacrifice… It’s not very cool to separate two banshees after all, wouldn’t you think?” She got ready to pull the string, took out a knife and put it near Lydia’s throat. “One last philosopher.”

“No!” Stella screamed like it could help and save her close friend. This strawberry blonde girl was the closest girl friend she had after Allison. She didn’t want to lose her. She hated even the thought of it and then she remembered all of those times she thought to herself, how she was going to find Darach and kill it with her bare hands.

Yeah, she found her, alright, but she could barely move.

“Drop it!” She opened her eyes, hearing Sheriff’s demanding voice. He was pointing his gun towards Ms. Blake and looking at her with focused eyes. Ms. Blake threw the knife at him, instead of dropping it and Stella watched it thrust into his shoulder.

Stella closed her eyes, tried to calm herself down. She focused on her breathing, shut her brain to the outside world and tried to remember her Argent training.

This was the first thing she’s ever done with her uncle. Chris tied her up to a chair just like that and waited for her to escape it. She managed to do that in two hours, being one of the best records that anyone has ever seen in a first try but right now, she had to do it quicker. She gave in and gave out deep breathes. When she thought she was calmer, she opened her eyes back and carefully reached out for the Chinese daggers that she had in her boot. 

She softly smiled and then started cutting the rope slowly and when she was finally free, she looked around. Scott was on the floor few inches away from them. She had no idea when he got here. There was a desk pushed in front of the door and Stella saw Stiles looking inside, worrying about his friends and his dad.

Stella quickly turned to Lydia and helped her, cut the ropes that tied her down. After she made sure Lydia was okay, she turned to Ms. Blake. The sharp points of the daggers were facing her. She could feel the pain in her wrist that was only because of how tight Ms. Blake tied her up with hard ropes. But she found the strength in her to ignore it.

Ms. Blake formed a pity smile on her face, looking at her. “You really think those will hurt me Stella?” she asked, taking a step towards Stella.

Instead of answering her mocking question, Stella quickly stepped forward and attacked Ms. Blake. She attacked few times, only for Ms. Blake to dodge every single one and then with the movement of her hand, she threw Stella to a wall. Stella hit hear head, scowling in pain as she fell to the ground.

She started walking towards her to end her but then Sheriff barely stood up and looked at Ms. Blake. “There was a girl!” he shouted to get her attention away from Stella. “Years ago, we found her in the woods, her face and body slashed apart.” He looked at her, holding his bleeding arm. “That was you, wasn’t it?”

Ms. Blake started walking towards him, nodding. She totally forgot about Stella who tried to force herself up. Her hand found her head, feeling the warm liquid on her skin. Her forehead was bleeding and even though, it wasn’t that bad, she couldn’t force herself to stand up. She stumbled and fell down again. She just didn’t have the enough strength in her.

“Maybe I should’ve started with philosophers, with knowledge and strategy” Ms. Blake reacted. Sheriff shot her but it quickly healed. “Healers.” Stella heard her chuckle in victory as she thought about what Talia said to her. She told her not to blame herself for what was about to happen. But… how couldn’t she? She thought to herself while Stiles was watching his dad from away and Stella couldn’t do anything to save him. She couldn’t even stand up, let alone fight. Her vision was blurry and she felt like losing consciousness.

Stella couldn’t hold on much longer. She was trying to keep her eyes open but failed to do so. Her hand and her head fell to the ground. She tried to keep her eyes focused. She saw Lydia running towards her with a worried look on her face. She saw Ms. Blake stabbing Sheriff and twisting the knife, causing him to drop his gun.

Then she closed her eyes and blacked out.


	10. THE OVERLOOKED

“Stella.” Stella could hear someone, probably her cousin, calling her name as she started blinking. Her vision wasn’t clear yet. She could feel her head and her wrist hurting like hell. She shut her eyes back again, winced and then opened them back on to see concerned brown eyes looking at her. “Stella, you okay?” The moment she saw her cousin, she suddenly felt the guilt. She knew she couldn’t save the Sheriff.

She knew she’s failed.

Stella looked around her. Allison was standing in front of her, holding her arm and helping her get up. Aiden was looking at her from afar, obviously worried about her. And her uncle was focused on his niece even though he was sending deathly glances at Aiden time to time. He wasn’t necessarily happy that the alpha twin was there right now

“You alright, honey?” Chris said, grabbing Stella’s left arm, helping Allison with getting Stella up. When Stella was finally on her feet, her hand traveled up to her head. The pain, the ache was still there. The blood was dry but her wound was no longer bleeding. She looked down at her hand, saw the red tight rope marks around it. She did a quick self-check-up. Physically she felt fine, but she wasn’t sure about her mental state.

“I’m fine. Where are Scott and Stiles?” Stella asked, not focusing more on the question of her well-being. She didn’t focus on where Sheriff was. She just had to know where are the others because she already knew. He was gone. He was taken by the Darach but she was going to save him.

She had to.

Stella looked at her uncle and her cousin. No one answered. So, she tried to take a step forward but almost fell on her face as she stumbled. “Hey, hey, hey!” Allison quickly caught her by the arm and helped her get her balance back. Seeing she was in good hands, Aiden stepped back but kept his concerned gaze on her. “Stella, take it easy” Allison said, trying to stop her. “You hit your head pre-”

Stella looked at her angrily, shutting her up and interrupting her. “I couldn’t save Sheriff” she responded sharply. “I let her beat me up and play with my mind. But you…” She stopped, took a deep breath. She tried to remind herself that her anger wasn’t towards Allison. But it was sure as hell that she failed herself yet again as she continued. “But you… You did everything right. So, please, answer this one goddamn question.” She looked at her cousin, her uncle and then Aiden. She took a deep breath as she felt her hands curled up into a fist. “Where the hell are Scott and Stiles?”

“They went to warn Derek about Jennifer” Aiden said calmly, despite everyone else in the room. Stella silently thanked him with a glance and grabbed her Chinese daggers from the floor. She felt dizzy for the first second but quickly pulled herself together and then without saying anything else, she left the room. She could hear Aiden running behind her, but she didn’t stop until she reached her car and then all of a sudden, she felt a hand on her shoulder and found herself facing Aiden. “Where do you think you’re going?” Stella let out a small chuckle in disbelief, raising her eyebrows and looking at him. She didn’t say anything. Meanwhile Aiden was aware of what’s happening. He knew her wrist was still hurting, and she hit her head pretty bad that she might have had a concussion. “You’re not going alone.”

Stella burst into laughter. It was almost hysterical. Aiden didn’t expect her to react that way, so it gave Stella an opportunity to free herself from his grip. “Oh, really? And who is exactly going to be my knight in shining armor?” Stella asked sarcastically. “You are in no position to order me around Aiden. You’ve never been, and you’ll never be.” She stopped and let out the breath she took. “Sheriff being kidnapped is my fault and I am going to do something about it!” She stopped again, noticing Ethan as he got out of the school door and started walking towards them. “Besides, duty calls” she announced. “Go, be a big bad wolf instead of trying to be he knight. That’s not what you’re good at.”

She didn’t stop to see his or Ethan’s reaction. She turned around, got into her car. She started the engine with her heart going wild inside her chest and as she got out of from the parking lot, she looked at in her rear-view mirror. Saw her puffed eyes, the redness. She took a deep breath and gave it out. “Okay, banshee, or whatever the hell that is powers…” she murmured to herself. “I am embracing you. Take me to wherever I need to be or I’m going to start throwing punches.”

When she finally caught up what she was doing and lifted her head up, she was pretty confused. Last thing she remembered was in her car, driving in the highway and now she was looking at Stiles with a baseball bat; Scott; Derek who was holding Ms. Blake by the arm and Peter who was laying on the floor, defeated. There were black blood drops on the floor that lead to a door.

And as she walked over to Derek and the others, she knew she had to adapt to the situation as quickly as possible.

Peter, still laying on the floor, laid his head back to look at others. “We got a problem” he said, stating the obvious. Stella looked at the doors ahead of them at the same time as Peter who looked back at the problem in front of them. “A very big one.”

Stella wasn’t surprised when she felt nothing as she looked at the thing in front of her and see who they were. It wasn’t a shock effect for Stella to see Ethan and Aiden but merged into the giant alpha that they were. She knew Aiden was using her, all of his acts were just big lies. She knew that. She was using him, too.

With anger she built up inside her, she reached for her Chinese daggers that she was keeping inside her boots in their cases. The twins roared and then growled, looking at their direction. Derek and Scott wolfed out with their claws and fangs and glowing eyes.

Stella watched Derek run towards them with a roar as she squeezed the non-sharp, holding parts of the daggers.

Scott ran towards the twins as well when he saw Derek getting beaten up. Still watching them, Stiles leaned towards Peter. His hazel eyes moved onto Cora, seeing her laying down on the ground unconsciously. “Help me” he demanded as he grabbed Peter and helped him get on his feet.

As they both ran to help Cora and get her somewhere away, Stella heard Scott’s voice. “Ethan, Aiden stop!” he shouted, looking at them. “You don’t know what you’re doing!” Seeing Scott in trouble and in need, Stella forgot about Ms. Blake. She immediately started running towards them to help them.

As Stella swung the daggers to the giant alpha, attacking them, her expression was full of anger. She watched the giant alpha notice her and then growl. Everyone was so busy that no one noticed the escape of Ms. Blake, taking advantage of the situation in hand.

“You want to hurt me?!” Stella shouted at them. She pointed the sharp section of the daggers towards the twins. Somehow, she felt like she was only talking to Aiden but she didn’t break out of character and her anger didn’t fade away. She kept shouting. She didn’t see the inner hesitation of the twins. She felt too angry with herself, with… Aiden… to notice anything else around her. “Come and hurt me.”

“All we want is her!” Giant alpha growled as their response. They looked at Stella and Scott but then started running after the young-looking woman to catch her who was already in the elevator, making her escape. Stella and Scott stayed behind in shock as their eyes followed the twins. 

And the only reason to that was the fact that Scott and the others’ priority were Cora, for the moment because she didn’t look good at all. She was laying down unconsciously ever since her black out in the Stilinski house when they were planning to try to tell the Sheriff all about the supernatural world.

They grabbed Cora and then started running with twins behind them since they kind of let Ms. Blake run away. “Don’t stop!” Scott shouted as he noticed the twins coming after them. “Don’t stop!” Everyone kept running but then Stella noticed that Stiles was standing with a wooden bat in his hands. His eyes moved on the bat and then he walked over the door. He stood by near it and when the twins walked in, he hit them with the bat from behind but instead of something happening to them, it only smashed the bat in half instead. She slowly stepped aside, walked up to Stella and then started running again to take Cora somewhere safe. 

The twins were separated at last as they were quietly walking down the hospital hallway to look for the Darach who was sacrificing people in attempt of trying to gain the power to kill them, everyone in the alpha pack. No one knew why but everyone got the idea that Ms. Blake hated Deucalion and his super alpha pack.

Aiden sharply exhaled, breaking the silence between him and his brother. “You hesitated” he accused, looking at his twin with an angry expression.

“I pulled back” Ethan corrected, knowing what his twin was talking about. When Scott told them that they had no idea what they were doing, he decided to pull back and he knew that he’d do it again since he stood behind everything he’s done. As he exhaled, he turned to his twin with the same angry expression. “There’s a difference.” Ethan couldn’t believe Aiden was the one who was blaming him on this. After all, he was the one who did the same thing when a certain someone came at them with that pointy dagger things.

“They’re protecting her!” Aiden shouted, still pretty angry.

“They don’t have a choice!” Ethan yelled back, getting closer to Aiden. He was slowly losing his control and they both knew that they were here for a mission. Having an argument with his brother was the last thing he was supposed to be doing right now.

“Neither do we!” Aiden responded, shouting again. He stopped walking and he looked at his twin. Ethan stopped on his spot as well, seeing his brother wasn’t moving. Aiden kept shouting at him, being harsh with him due his anger. “If all these sacrifices, all these bodies pilling up, if it’s actually giving her the power to get rid of us, then we need to take any chance we can to get rid of her.”

When Aiden took few steps, walked past Ethan, he had to stop again as he heard Ethan’s amusing scoff and then his voice. “Maybe” he said furiously and frustratedly. His brother was right. He knew he was. But Ethan definitely wasn’t going to just stand there and take all the blame for it. “But let me remind you, I am not the only one who, in your terms, hesitated.”

Aiden rolled his eyes, turned towards him and looked at his brother. “What are you trying to say to me Ethan?” he asked in a threatening way that didn’t affect Ethan at all. He started walking again, not caring about his accusations.

“I wasn’t the one who pulled back when Stella attacked us, Aiden” Ethan stroke back, walking beside him with a teasing expression and then quickly continued with a knowing voice. “It was you.”

Hearing the name that Ethan used to attack him, Aiden stopped. He quickly turned to his brother and went closer, threatening him. “Do not… _ever_ … talk about her.” Aiden’s voice was sharp as a knife. He stopped on every word just to emphasize every single one of them. “You understand me?”

But it didn’t affect Ethan as his expression became more teasing, more mocking. They were still nose to nose, threatening one and other. “You like the huntress, don’t you?” Ethan asked like he was enjoying Aiden’s suffering. He already knew the answer. He knew his brother more than Aiden wanted to admit and knowing the answer, he could say he was definitely enjoying the situation. It was his twin after all and Ethan knew Aiden was definitely messed up about this which was a new thing for him.

Aiden tried to laugh it off. “Don’t be ridiculous Ethan” he said, taking a step back.

“Believe me, brother” Ethan said, scoffing. “I am not the one who is being ridiculous here. It’s all you.” He softly shook his head with a sarcastic grin. “You are in love with an Argent. An alpha werewolf is in love with a huntress. Doesn’t it sound ridiculous to you?” Ethan softly patted on his shoulder before keep on walking. Aiden followed his brother, but he was slowly getting furious again. He just didn’t know if it was towards Ethan or himself. Of course, he decided that it was towards Ethan when his brother continued again, mocking him. “But let me tell you what’s going to happen, Aiden.” He looked at his brother from the corner of his eyes as they kept walking. The hallway seemed quiet and deserted as Ethan continued. “Nothing” he sharply said. “You are an alpha werewolf who can kill everyone, even her friends and her family just to survive. She is an excellent hunter who can kill everyone, even you, just to protect her family and her friends. She is not good with emotions. She would never admit to anything. Even I know her enough to know that.” Ethan’s finger moved between Aiden and the empty spot like Stella was there. “Nothing is going to happen between you two.”

He kept walking, leaving his brother behind with thoughts.

They were in some room like Morgue when the power went off and generator kicked in. Peter put Cora down to get rid of her weight off his back since he was the one who carried her on his back the whole time. As he laid her down onto a metal table, Stella looked around. Scott and Derek ran inside after them. Derek closed the door and then looked out at the hallway through the window on the door.

“Where’s the big guy?”

“He’s close” Scott answered.

“Where’s Ms. Blake?” Stiles asked, looking at Scott who was shaking his head, saying he doesn’t know. “What do you mean? What does it mean? Like, she’s gone? Scott, are you kidding me?” he yelled out with anger.

“Shh, quiet!”

As Stiles heard Derek’s demand, he directed his anger towards the werewolf. “Me be quiet? Are you telling me what to do now?” he shouted. He was angry and Derek… Well, he knew Stiles was right so he had nothing to say to him as he continued. “When your psychotic, mass murdering girlfriend… The second one you’ve dated, by the way… has got my dad somewhere, tied up, waiting to be ritually sacrificed.”

Stella walked over to Peter, instead of hearing their argument. She also knew Stiles had every right to be angry but she had something else in her mind as her gaze fell upon Cora. Peter was perusing her, ignoring the young Argent. Cora looked like she was just getting worse by the minute.

“Ms. Blake told me that, uh…” Stella murmured, using a volume that only Peter could hear. She softly moved her tongue on her lips as she felt nervous and finished her sentence. “… that I’m a banshee.” She licked her lips again as she put her hand on Cora’s forehead. She had a high fever and there was a black blood stain near her mouth. “She told me and Lydia that we are two banshees who completes each other.” She looked at Peter, her hand still on Cora’s face. “Do you know what it means?”

The werewolf had an unreadable expression, but Stella could swear it almost looked like fear and worry but before he could say something, Scott’s concerned voice reached to them from the back. “Is she really dying?” he asked.

Peter kept looking at Stella, waiting the answer from possible banshee. Understanding that, Stella took a deep breath and she looked down at Cora. “She’s definitely not getting any better” she murmured under her breath.

“There has to be something that we can do. We have to help her” Scott reacted, not knowing what do do. 

That’s when the doors opened to both sides, and Ms. Blake appeared in the doorstep.

“You can’t” she said, causing everyone to look at her with anger. “Only I can. I can save her, and I can tell you where Sheriff Stilinski is. But there is a pack of alphas in this hospital who want me dead.” She exhaled as she kept her gaze on them. “So, I’ll help you… But only when I’m out of here and safe.” Everyone was looking at her as Ms. Blake continued. “Only then.”

It was almost like Derek didn’t hear a single word or understand anything because as soon as she stopped talking, he flipped the table over angrily and got ready to attack her but thank to Scott, he couldn’t go that far. “She was trying to get out!” Derek yelled, angrily pointing her.

“I was trying to keep from getting killed” she responded, correcting his assumption. Stella kept herself from rolling her eyes. “You can’t blame me for that.”

“If you want to show you’re one of the good guys, heal her” Derek said, taking a step forward. He was still angry, and Stella couldn’t really blame him for that. He had every right to be.

“Not until I’m safe” Ms. Blake responded, looking down at her feet. Stella didn’t know what she was feeling but she didn’t trust any of her acts at all. Not after everything.

“I’d like to volunteer a different method of persuasion.” When Stella heard Peter’s voice, she turned to look at him, taking a breath in. “Let’s torture her.”

“Works for me” Stella reacted, raising her hand up as she looked between Peter and Jennifer. Stella could see that this could for work Derek as well. As he freed himself from Scott’s grip, Stella knew he was going to attack her again but stopped when Melissa’s voice filled up the room through the speakers in the hospital.

“Uhm, can I have your attention?” she said, her voice breaking. “Mr. Deucalion… Excuse me, just Deucalion… Requests you bring the woman calling herself Jennifer Blake to the E.R. reception. Do this, and everyone else can leave. You have ten minutes.”

The announcement ended, causing everyone to look back at Jennifer angrily who was looking at Scott. “He’s not going to hurt her” she confidently told him.

“Shut up!” Derek ordered, pointing her aggressively.

“He won’t!” Jennifer repeated herself, still standing in the doorway. “Scott, you know why. Tell them, it’s true.” 

“What does she mean?” Derek asked, looking at Scott. Ms. Blake raised her eyebrows as she looked at Scott, waiting for him to explain like the rest of them. But when nothing came out from Scott’s lips, she rolled her eyes, sighed, and started explaining herself as she made everyone to look back at her.

She looked at Derek. “You’re not the only one he wants in his pack!” she started explaning and continued. “Deucalion doesn’t just want an alpha pack. He wants perfection. That means adding the rarest of alphas to his ranks.”

“A true alpha” Peter murmured, looking at Scott.

“What’s that?” Stiles asked.

“The kind that doesn’t have to steal their power from another” Stella murmured, looking at Scott with a little frown. “One that can rise by the force of their own will.”

“Our little Scott” Peter murmured. He was still looking at Scott, but he had a smile that was far away from being proud.

It was almost like he saw an opening.

“It doesn’t matter” Scott said, shaking his head and looking at Peter and feeling uncomfortable under all of their gazes. “We still need to get her out of here.”

“Scott, your mom…” Stiles said, taking a step forward.

But Scott interrupted him to complete his sentences in a different way. “My mom said there’s one more ambulance coming in 20 minutes” he said and then continued. “And I don’t think we’ve been here that long, so if we can get down to the garage, get to the last ambulance, we can get out of here.”

As Scott kept looking at Derek, Stella shrugged. She was looking back and forth between the people in the room. “The twins aren’t gonna let us just walk out” she said with a flat voice as she shook her head.

“I’ll distract them” Scott said, looking at Stella.

“You mean fight them” Derek translated as his eyes found Scott.

He shrugged as a response. “Whatever I have to do.”

“I’ll help you” Derek said as he slightly nodded his head.

But Jennifer had different plans. “Um, sorry,” she said, shaking her head. “but I’m not going anywhere without you, Derek.”

“Then me and Stella would be the perfect help for you” Peter advised, slowly lifting his head up to look at the others, causing everyone except Stiles to look at him with confusion.

Stella knotted, creating wrinkles between her eyebrows as she looked at Peter. “Why me?” she asked. 

Stiles understanding Peter’s not-so brilliant plan, let out a soft scoff as he turned his body to look at Stella. “You made Aiden hesitate” he explained as he remembered Peter’s reference moment. Because of his anxiety, he was talking with his hands. “When you screamed at him, he stepped back. He didn’t attack you. He probably won’t attack you… ever.”

“Exactly” Peter confirmed, looking at her and then he let his shoulders down and looked at Derek and Scott. “But I’d prefer to be out there with another advantage as well.”

“What kind of advantage? You mean like a weapon?” Stiles asked, looking at Peter.

As the werewolf look at him with an annoying smile, he opened his mouth. “Something better than a baseball bat.”

Everyone was running around in the room, opening drawers while just trying to find something for Peter to use as a weapon when they go out there.

Well… Everyone except for Stella.

Stiles pulled up the electroshock device to the air to show everyone. “Hey, wait, what about these?” he asked.

Stella raised her eyebrows, crossed her arms in front of her chest and looked at the young man as she rested her back against the wall. “Do you know how to use those?” she asked with a fake curiosity.

Stiles’ gaze moved between the shock device in his hands to Stella who was looking back at him, waiting for an answer. “No” he answered, turning his head to sideways to avoid staring straight but only to look at others who were also looking back at him.

“Put them down” Derek reacted and then kept on searching through medical stuff. Stella took a deep breath as she scratched her nose in exhaustion.

They kept looking through the drawers and everything they could find when, finally, Scott stood up with a syringe that was full with some kind of liquid inside. He looked around at the people that he was in the room with. “Epinephrine?” he suggested, raising his eyebrows.

“That’s only gonna make them stronger” Derek answered him.

Stella frowned with a thought and, apparently, she wasn’t alone either. “How strong?” Peter asked but without waiting for an answer Stella grabbed the needle from Scott and jabbed it into Peter’s shoulder.

“Let’s find out” she exclaimed with a mocking smile on her face. As the epinephrine started kicking in, Peter threw the empty needle away. It landed somewhere in the room. He started blinking his eyes, trying to adjust his body to power of the epinephrine, waiting for it to completely sink in.

Stella reached for her gun that she put in the back of her jeans, between the fabric and her naked waist. In the meantime, Peter was all better. They exchanged a look and then stepped outside to room and into the hallway. The twins were already there, waiting for them, looking at them.

Stella pressed her lips together into a straight and angry line as she looked at Scott and Peter once again. She didn’t know why she specifically had to be there with them but there she was, getting ready the distract while the others get to the ambulance with Cora.

“Alright boys,” Peter exclaimed, feeling the extra strength that epinephrine was providing him as he glowed his eyes alongside of Scott. They grew their claws and fangs out when the twins started growling at them. Stella grabbed her gun, held it tight as she heard Peter again. “Let’s rumble.”

Twins roared, Stella squeezed her gun handle tighter and got ready as she aimed at them.

As the werewolf started running towards each other from different start points, Stella stayed behind and watched the twins merge into the big giant alpha again. Ethan kneeled down and Aiden grabbed him by the neck and then they started getting bigger and bigger. Stella couldn’t help but cursed at the fact that she was here but she aimed at them anyway. She started pulling the trigger, shotting at them. She was trying to be careful because she didn’t want to shoot Peter or Scott accidently.

She was more careful about Scott, though.

The gunshot noises echoed in the little hallway as one of them hit the giant alpha on their shoulder. The twins stopped, looked at the young girl. They seemed shocked as they saw the person who was holding the gun. They had a moment of conflict inside which gave Scott and Peter an advantage as they attacked them.

But that conflict gained them only few seconds.

The twins kept throwing Peter and Scott to the fall and then watched them fall to the ground while Stella kept shooting them with her gun. Thank Goodness that she was an excellent shot because if not, she’d already hit the ones she didn’t want instead of Aiden or Ethan.

But then she ran out of bullets. Understanding that, Scott and Peter decided it was enough and started running towards her. Scott grabbed Stella’s arm and pulled her with them. As he let go, she kept running but still managed to recharge her gun.

As they kept running, she could see hear the twins coming after them.

“That shot didn’t last very long” Peter murmured as he fell to the ground when he was out of the extra strength. Scott stopped running and went back to help him. For the rest of the way down to the garage, Scott carried Peter while Stella ran behind them. She kept shooting at them, though, to slow them down and give themselves some more time. She didn’t even care if she hit them or not. Running while shooting back was extremely hard.

Scott, Peter and Stella stepped into the first room they saw when the twins were nowhere to be seen.

“Those twins are really starting to piss me off” Peter said angrily, between his teeth. Even though the room was pretty dark, Stella could see around her clearly. She picked up some drawers and some more metal tables while Scott walked up to the door and looked through the class to see if the corridor was clear.

Stella looked at Peter, panting. “You plan sucked, Hale” she ranted as she tried catch her breath and calm her heart down. Stella brushed her messy hair back while Peter turned towards her and locked his gaze on her. “Aiden didn’t seem to hesitate at all. Hell, I can ever swear that he wanted to rip me apart when I shot at him.”

He had his signature expression on as he talked. “I call the plan you think it sucked; I actually call perfectly worked” Peter said. He didn’t roll his eyes but with that tone, he might have as well done that anyway. With his werewolf eyes and attention, he saw the giant hesitating for a split second and in their world, even a split second could mean a lot. “Let me remind you that we were trying to stall them, not kill them.”

“Okay, now how the hell are we supposed to get out of here?” Scott whispered as he looked away from the hallway to Peter and Stella.

Peter let out a soft but sarcastic smile as he looked back at Scott. “Personally, I think if we keep letting them beat the living crap out of us, they’ll tire and give up” he responded.

Stella looked at Peter, loving this goddamn idea. “I think, you should keep letting them beat the living crap out of yourself while me and Scott get the hell out of here” she said, correcting his plan in her own way and then she looked at Scott. She directed her index finger towards Peter who was still sitting down on the ground because the epinephrine withdrawal. “That’s what I call a perfect idea.” Scott tried to hold his soft laughter behind because he also thought it was a great idea but he knew it wasn’t an idea that he would go through. And then saw the little door on the wall. As Peter and Stella looked at the direction he was looking at, Stella’s eyes opened widely. It was like those wall elevators but instead it was written ‘laundry door’ on it. Stella knew it was going somewhere through long ass pipes which never sounded fun to Stella. She quickly turned to look at Scott. “Don’t you dare think about it, Scott.”

“Let us go first” the werewolf responded. “We’ll hold you.” As Stella listened to him, she grimaced because she knew that they had no other choice.

Stella squeezed every muscle on her body, sliding down the pipes. She painfully groaned as she fell on Scott and Peter in the laundry bascinet that the pipes led them down to. Without losing a second or looking at them, she pulled herself out. She was grateful for her soft and safe fall but she knew she would never do that again.

She quickly turned around and helped Scott out but left Peter in there who groaned as he looked at Stella, complaining the situation. “You couldn’t have waited, for like, ten seconds?” he questioned, looking at the young Argent who just shrugged and grinned like she didn’t care. She watched Peter roll his eyes which was pretty entertaining. He cracked the joint of his knuckles while Stella turned around and then Scott’s phone buzzed. As he looked down, Peter already knew what was happening. “They didn’t get out, did they?”

Peter finally let himself out of the basket and they started running fast to the garage, where the others were.

When they arrived to the ambulance, Scott knocked on the door to tell Stiles to open it for them. After the doors were open, Scott quickly helped Peter to get inside and sit down since he was worse than them after the effect of epinephrin.

“Where is Derek and Jennifer?” Stiles asked as he helped Peter get inside the back of the ambulance as well. After Peter sat down, he let go off his arm and kept looking at Scott and Stella who were still standing outside the ambulance, looking back at them from there.

“I have to go back for them and for my mom” Scott responded to him and then turned to his right to look at Stella. “You stay here. Peter’s in no shape to fight and you have a gun.” Stella nodded, confirming and agreeing with him.

“Okay, two problems” Stiles said quickly as he grabbed Stella by her hand and helped in. Stella sat next to Peter inside the ambulance. Stiles’ hazel eyes moved on from Stella to Scott as he continued, talking to them both. “Kali’s got the keys to this thing, and I just saw the twins, like, 30 seconds ago.”

Hearing that, Scott looked back over his shoulder as Peter scanned the outside of the ambulance through the windshield. Then, Scott turned his head and looked at Stiles again. “I don’t think twins will do something while Stella is here” he said in hurry. “Aiden looks like he doesn’t want to hurt her.”

Stella rolled her eyes. “Okay, let’s say that you’re right about them” she responded, making Scott look at her. “What is your big plan with Kali?” She crossed her arms in front of her chest and raised her eyebrows, keeping her gaze on Scott. “With your argument or not, she doesn’t care about me the way twins do. Kali won’t think twice if it comes to killing all of us.” And then she annoyedly scoffed. “Funny. I don’t even think Ethan and Aiden would do either but I’m not going to argue with your logic.”

Scott looked at Stella. There was nothing he could say to her that was going to make her believe in what everyone except she saw, so he just sighed. “Just stay here, okay?” he said. Stella exhaled from her nose and shook her head in disbelief but agreeing with him.

Then, Scott closed the doors of the ambulance after them and walked away, leaving them alone.

“Hey” Stiles called out for her after a moment of silence. Hearing his voice, she lifted her head up to look at him who had worry sparkles flying around inside his hazel eyes. Probably for herself, definitely for Cora… “You alright?” Stella nodded, confirming him but then looked at Peter out of the corner of her eyes. He was looking at her as well, not believing that she was okay just like Stiles.

Stella started playing with her fingers as she looked down at them, anxiety building up inside her. She sighed and parted her lips. “I was just thinking about what Jennifer said to me and Lydia before she tried to kill us” she softly whispered. She took a deep breath and looked at Cora who was still unconscious and burning up in a dangerous fever. She exhaled out of her nose; her fingers left each other. She lifted her head up to look at Peter and Stiles as she continued. “Two banshees who complete each other” she repeated Jennifer. The words that she heard only few hours ago. It felt like a lifetime… “I’ve been trying to understand what the hell she was talking about because, as far as I know, there’s only one kind of banshee mentioned in the bestiary.” She waggled her eyebrows, thinking about something. Took another breath, gave it out. “Or there are more that…” She brushed her hair back. “I don’t know. I really don’t know anymore.” She sighed. She felt like there was an elephant sitting on her chest and she just couldn’t get rid of it. “I know some monsters, I mean, some creatures have more than one kind under the same name but Banshees?” She shook her head. “Not so much. It doesn’t go any further than bad and good separation.”

Stiles frowned and then looked at Peter. “Do you know anything about this?” he asked. Peter’s gaze moved from his niece to Stiles as the young Stilinski continued. “You’ve done the same thing to Lydia. You must know something, right?”

“Pieces” he answered as a whisper. He lifted his head up to look at Stella and Stiles and then Stella again. “I know about Lydia but you? Stories, myths and legends… I don’t know which ones are true and which ones are crap.” He scoffed as he continued. “I know one thing for sure, though.” Peter’s voice was sharp. It made Stella’s skin crawl for some reason, like whatever she was… It wasn’t that good. As Hale continued, his gaze was locked on Stella. “You and Lydia… You girls have some kind of a…” He paused, thinking about the right word to use. “… bond. That’s the reason why Jennifer described you as two banshees that complete each other. And let me tell you.” His blue eyes moved on between Stella and Stiles who were carefully listening to him. “Two banshees in the same place…? It’s never a good sign.”


	11. ALPHA PACT

Isaac parked the car right next to the ambulance for Peter and Stella to carry Cora easily and put her inside. Stiles meant to go after them but as he was closing the ambulance’s back door, he noticed something on the form that attached on the back of the door. He kept his gaze on the form, looking underneath while Isaac got into the car without losing any time.

Stella turned to look at Stiles. “Stilinski, let’s go!” she yelled out. They were in a hurry and they had to get out of here as soon as possible. Stiles looked at the form again and then back to Stella. And all of a sudden, instead of getting into the car, he ran back inside the hospital. Stella paused for a second before she yelled after him. “Stilinski!” When Stiles didn’t stop or hear her, Stella turned to the others. “Go!” she told them, gesturing Isaac to drive and then she ran after Stiles inside.

Stella caught up with him in front of the elevators. “Stilinski, what the-” she shouted as she was running towards him to the elevator but then saw what he was looking at. It was Derek laying down on the floor inside the cabin. She walked over to him and right when she was about crouch down next to Derek, from the corner of her eyes, she saw Scott, running somewhere else. She couldn’t help frown as she looked at Stiles. “Where is he going?” she asked curiously.

Stiles stood up and before he went after Scott, he looked at Stella. “You stay here,” he said and then left her alone with an unconscious Derek. 

After a few tryouts on trying to wake Derek up, Stella finally gave up and sat down on the ground, resting her back against the elevator’s metal cabin. She took a deep breath and loudly gave it out. She wasn’t worried about Derek since she knew he was breathing and he was going to be okay but the other stuff that was flying around in her mind was enough to drive her crazy.

Her headache was also getting worse.

She sat there in silence with her closed eyes as she was trying to clear her mind until Stiles came back without Scott. Noticing him, she quickly straightened up and moved down to her knees next to Derek. She watched Stiles do the same as the voices in her mind kept saying the same thing over and over again, shouting the same thing over and over again. Stella tried to ignore them, feeling anxious as much as Stiles. Of course, she didn’t feel the need to ask why Stiles felt the way he did because she already had the answer.

She felt it. She heard it.

“We have to wake him up” Stiles anxiously told her, kneeling near Derek. His gaze found Stella and then moved back to Derek.

Meanwhile Stella kept looking at Stiles in disbelief. “Are you serious?” she asked, almost shouting. And then continued with more curiosity and sarcasm. “How are you planning to do that exactly, genius?”

Stiles shrugged, shaking his head and then looking back and forth between Derek and Stella as he had no idea what else to do. “I-I don’t know.” He paused to think of a way, looked around and then looked back at Stella. “Punch him, maybe?” he suggested, his voice shattering due to his rising up anxiety.

“Derek is a kind of guy that would wake up just to punch you back if you punch him first and then just…” She slightly shook her head. “… faints back again.” But then she put her hands in the air and tilted her head softly to the side. “But hey” she exclaimed. “I don’t have a better plan so… If you want to try, I am not going to stop you.”

Stiles knew it wasn’t the best choice but the only choice in their hands so as he took a deep breath, he started punching and then slapping Derek. Basically, anything that would get him to wake up.

At the same time, he started shouting. “Derek! Derek, you gotta wake up!” Stella looked at Stiles who was still punching and calling out for Derek.

Finally, after a while, right when Stiles hand was in the air for another punch, Derek woke up and grabbed Stiles’ fist before it met with his face. “Where is she?” Derek asked angrily and confused as he was looking around.

“Jennifer?” Stella repeated his question as she added a little bit of annoyance and sarcasm. All because she was so tired of running around and the voices in her head wouldn’t stop. She was about to sign herself into a mental hospital. It was just a matter of time. “Gone with Scott’s mom after knocking you out.” Stiles couldn’t help but look at Stella because he was sure he never told her what happened but after everything that they’ve been through, he wasn’t that shock either. It was just a normal Tuesday night for them.

“She took her?” Derek asked, lifting his head up.

“Yes” Stella said, not giving Stiles a chance to speak. She took a deep breath, closed her eyes and then opened them back again. “Which only means she needs one more person. We’re running out of time.”

Derek’s gaze moved on her face for a while, catching something in Stella’s eyes and her voice tone. As he frowned, he opened his mouth. “You know who she’s going to take” he softly said.

Stella’s lips partly fell apart but closed again, not knowing what to say. She took a deep breath and as she gave it out, her lips fell apart one more time. “I…” She laid her head back as she sighed and pressed her lips to each other. She closed her eyes. When she opened them back, she looked at Derek and Stiles who were carefully looking at her, waiting for an explanation from her. “The voices” she murmured. “They keep saying the same thing.” She looked at Stiles. As she answered the question in Stiles’ mind that he didn’t get a chance to ask, her voice was trembling. “Started right after she took Melissa.” Her eyes moved to Derek. “Argent. They keep saying the same name. In every goddamn language, screaming… whispering… But it’s all the same. Argent.”

“Your uncle is next” Stiles murmured, looking at Stella. As the young girl licked her lips and nodded to confirm him, Stiles looked at Derek in hurry and, heatedly, he took it from there. “If that’s not enough of a kick to the balls, Scott left with Deucalion, okay? So, we gotta get you out of here. The police are coming right now, and we gotta get you the hell out of here.”

Stella and Stiles quickly grabbed Derek and helped him stand on his feet without giving him a chance to speak, but as soon as he was standing still, he looked at them. “What about Cora?” he curiously asked, concerned about his sister.

Stella let out a breath as they stepped out of the elevator. “She is with Peter and Isaac” she answered him as they started walking in the hallway to the exit. She looked at him. “We’ll help her, Derek, but can we please get the hell out of here first?”

Stella driving Derek’s car, they quickly caught up with Isaac, Allison and Chris. Young girl stopped the engine and parked the car and without losing more time, she climbed out of it. She quickly walked over to her cousin who was looking at her, standing in front of the black vehicle as she parted her lips. “Where’s Scott and Stiles?” she asked, watching her cousin walk towards her.

“Stilinski is still at the hospital” Stella answered, shouting to get her voice heard through the loud and crazy wind. “He’s gonna hold off the cops for us. Alpha Hale, here, just got to himself, so I had to drive us here.”

Derek didn’t even bother to roll his eyes, he looked at others. “We have to go right now” he told them.

“What about Scott and Melissa?” Chris asked. Stella tried to avoid looking at them as she slid her hand inside her pocket and grabbed her keys to her car that Allison drove here.

“Jennifer took Melissa” Derek answered Chris. His voice was almost lost in the wild wind, swallowing their words but he was heard by the others.

“What about Scott?” Allison asked, insisting. Stella started chewing her inner cheek in worry as she didn’t want to be the one to give her the bad news but Allison could see right through her and when no one else answered her, she found herself repeating the question once more. Her anxious eyes moved on Stella and Derek. “Where is Scott?” she asked, this time a little bit louder.

Derek stopped in front of his Jeep and he looked at Allison. Meanwhile Stella took a deep breath and looked into her cousin’s eyes. “He went with Deucalion” she said.

Stella followed her cousin with her own car to their apartment. Just because they didn’t have time to talk about it, Allison didn’t say anything about Scott going with Deucalion, but Stella knew she was overthinking it. But she didn’t push her on this, knowing it was probably hard for her to hear as well as hard for Stella to say it out loud.

Meanwhile in Stella’s mind, the voices were getting louder and louder every second. And her headache was getting so stronger that she barely noticed her phone loudly buzzing on the passenger seat. Stella sharply exhaled and grabbed her phone. It was a text message from Stiles with an attachment. It didn’t say anything, there was just a picture. Stella quickly opened the attachment and saw the huge graffiti on the elevator’s metal doors with, drawn with a bright red color. The word Argent with capital letters on the elevator door caused Stella to sigh in distress, feeling the weight on her chest getting heavier by the second. 

As she pressed her lips into a straight line, she threw her phone back to the passenger seat and parked her car in the garage. She climbed out and followed the others to their floor.

“The word is ‘guardian’ girls” Chris said as he entered his study with Allison, Stella and Stiles behind him. Stiles came to the apartment only few minutes after they did. Chris continued, trying to find his way out of it using Argent intelligence. “More than anyone, you know that’s a role I haven’t exactly lived up to lately.”

“But she took Scott’s mom and Stiles’ dad” Allison insisted, watching her father walk over to his chair. “That’s not a coincidence.”

“Yeah” Stiles confirmed as he walked in behind Stella who, later on, laid against the black bookcase as she was looking at her uncle. “I’d also consider the fact that someone put your name up in large block letters on the elevator doors. That kind of felt like a warning to me.”

“I think it might be Morell” Allison guessed, looking at Stiles and then back to her father. Stella crossed her arms in front of her chest as she kept looking at a blank spot in the air and thinking but listening to Chris, Allison and Stiles at the same time. “She knows a lot more than she lets on, and she might even be trying to help us.”

“Well, she needs to get on that a lot faster, okay?” Stiles reacted on Allison’s theory.

“Look, if you don’t want to, or, you know, don’t trust some supposedly guidance counselor’s warning on a freaking elevator…” Stella said, taking a deep breath as she pushed herself of off the bookcase and started walking towards him. Her eyes on her uncle. “Then, trust me.” Chris frowned as he looked back at his niece. Stella bit her lip, sighing. “The voices are, literally, screaming inside my brain. It started right after Jennifer took Melissa and they are yelling, screaming. Your name. Only your name.” Put her hands on the desk and focused her gaze on Chris. “You are the next victim, so please… Let us protect you.” 

“The full Moon is less than two days away” Stiles murmured, thinking and worrying about his father.

“Stilinski” Stella said, looking at her friend who threw himself onto the couch in despair. “Don’t give up hope.”

“They could already be dead” Stiles continued, letting the dark thought come at him.

“I don’t think so” Chris said, looking at Stiles as he slightly shook his head. Stella nodded as she agreed with her uncle. Her eyes found anxious-radiating Stiles while Chris continued. “There’s something about Jennifer’s tactics. It’s like she’s still positioning, still moving pieces into place.”

“And you’re one of them” Allison strongly added, determined to save her father as she looked in his eyes to show how serious this situation was. “Someone left a warning on an elevator door and Stella stated certainly that you’re next in line. Whenever something like that happened, she was right, dad. Every single time… You can’t expect her to be wrong now.” Allison took a deep breath. “She’s coming for you.”

“Then let’s not wait around to see the next move” Chris said as he reached for the map. That was the map he marked the places of the victims and sacrifices. Where they were found and where they were taken from… “Everything she’s done has been on telluric current.” He opened the map and placed it on the desk for everyone to see. “So, Melissa and the Sheriff have to be somewhere on one of those currents, right?” As Stella’s finger went up to her mouth nervously, she nodded. Meanwhile, Chris looked at Stiles who was nervously sitting on the couch. His arm was on the side, his chin was placed on the top of his fist and he was nervously watching the carpet. He looked at Chris, though, when he heard his voice directed at him. “Stiles, if we’re going to find them, we’re gonna need your help.”

“You seriously want to go after her?” Stiles asked as he connected his fingers and looked at them anxiously. Then he lifted his head and his hazel eyes found Chris again. “I mean, what if she just takes you like the others, huh? No offence, but what’s the difference between you and them?”

Hearing that question, Chris showed him his gun and then put the charger in as he parted his lips. “I’m carrying a 45” he said. “Maybe she can heal from a shot to the leg and a few slashes to the face, but personally, I’d like to see how she holds up with half of her skull blown off.” Chris put the gun down on the desk, his eyes still on Stiles. “We’ve got one priority right now, and that is to find Melissa and your dad. We’ve got a map and every clue we need to figure this out. The only thing we don’t have is time, which is why I need all three of you.”

Stiles stood up from the couch and walked over to them and placed his body between Allison and Stella. “Where do we start?” he asked within a sighed, making Chris to get the blue light and moved it over the map.

“The place where the sacrifices have been committed have usually been different from where the bodies have been found” he started his explanation. “I think the placement has to do with the strength of the current, so there’s the school…” As he was talking about the places, the blue ling went over them to show those three teenagers that have been listening to him. “… the animal clinic, the bank.”

“Wait a sec” Stiles said, making Chris stop talking and look at him. “She wouldn’t use the same place twice, would she?”

“Only if she didn’t succeed the first time, probably” Stella murmured, answering the question for Chris. As her uncle nodded, confirming her, his gaze was back on the map.

“Scott’s boss, Deaton” Allison said as Chris’ blue light went over the bank.

“It was her only failure” Chris confirmed, nodding. “That could mean something.”

“That’s just one place so far” Stiles thought out loud. “We’re gonna need a lot more help.”

“What about Lydia?” Stella asked, turning her head softly to look at Stiles. “Peter said it usually means danger when we are together but maybe we can use that, whatever the hell is that, to find psychopath English teachers.” She moved her eyebrows up and down. “Hell, maybe we can even use it against her.”

“Lydia?” Chris asked, looking at his niece. “What can she do? What powers?”

Stella couldn’t remember if she told Chris about the things Ms. Blake told her about Lydia and her. She probably didn’t because since then, it was all moving so fast. So, as she parted her lips to tell him about it now, Stiles acted quicker and started talking before Stella. “Uh, Lydia’s got some sort of talent” he responded, explaining. “She somehow ended up finding a couple of bodies, um, without actually looking.”

“What is she?” Chris knotted his eyebrows. “A psychic?”

Stella raised her eyebrows teasingly and looked at him. “Psychic?” she repeated mockingly.

“She’s something” Stiles responded as Allison started looking at him. Then he pointed Stella with his head and continued talking. “She’s kinda like Stella, apparently.”

This time Chris was the one who raised his eyebrows and he looked at his niece curiously. “Have you ever found a body?” Chris asked. Stella nodded. “When? Where? Why didn’t you tell us?”

“In France” Stella murmured. “About a week later after I went there. One of them was a werewolf, so I didn’t call the cops.” She sighed and then continued. “And I didn’t tell you because I went there to escape from all that. If you were to find out, it didn’t stop… Then…” She shook her head frustratedly, tired of the conversation. “… You know.”

“Okay, but what did you do with the body?” Stiles asked with a frown.

Stella shrugged and looked at him. “Burned and buried, so that no one would see it” she answered, making Allison and Chris to softly scoff but then Chris quickly got serious as they had something very important to deal with in front of them.

He put the blue light down. “Alright” he said as he emptied the table. “Stella, Allison… help me with the guns.”

Few minutes later, all of their armory was out and the study was filled with all sort of weapons on the desk, on the ground. It was almost everywhere, causing Stiles to step back. “Woah, I thought you guys were retired” he murmured while Allison clicked a gun. Stella and Chris kept taking out the stuff they needed while Stella softly scoffed, she whipped the Chinese daggers around her fingers and then quickly held them still.

“Retired, yes. Defenseless, no” Chris explained as Stella put the Chinese ring daggers back to their places. 

“You can’t really say retired, though” Stella murmured.

Chris looked at Stiles, ignoring Stella’s comment. “Make sure your phone is on” he ordered and continued. “If you hear from Scott, you let us know immediately.”

Stiles took out his blue cased phone, looked at it down for a moment as he softly answered Argent. “Yeah, I’m thinking that’s gonna be kind of unlikely.”

“Three of you, try to remember he’s just doing what he thinks it’s right” Chris warned them, putting his hands on his waist as he looked at them.

“Yeah, the last time I thought I was doing what it was right, I got arrested, so…” Stella murmured, making Chris to softly roll his eyes at the young girl. Stella shrugged, knowing the Argents had the whole story of her getting arrested. “Well, I held myself for a week, didn’t I? I mean… he had it coming.”

Chris decided to ignore and not answer her as he turned back to the weapons but then, all of a sudden, they heard a voice outside the door that caused them to turn around and see who it was, only to realize that it was Isaac, standing in the doorstep. “I can’t shoot a gun or use a crossbow but…” he said, looking at his claws. He moved his fingers and looked back at Chris and the others. “Well, I’m… I’m getting pretty good with these.”

“Great” Chris murmured and then looked at Stiles and Stella. “You both go back to school.” He didn’t stop as he pointed Allison and Isaac, he kept talking. “Me, Allison and Isaac-”

Stella quickly interrupted him. “No” she opposed, quickly turning in her spot to face her uncle. “I know… I get what you’re trying to send me back to school but… Chris…” She had to stop talking to calm herself down. She took a deep breath and gave it out as she continued talking. “The voices in my brain are driving me nuts, okay?” she dropped her shoulders. “The only way to stop them is to save you. I couldn’t save the sheriff. I couldn’t save Melissa. And I can’t pretend like everything is normal as I walk down the halls in school while you are going after some psychotic English teacher who wants to sacrifice you. I can’t.” She shook her head. “I won’t.”

She took a deep breath and then watched her uncle softly nod.

“It’s empty” Allison observed as they walked inside the vault where Darach wanted to sacrifice Deaton but couldn’t because of Scott. Stella frowned, narrowing her eyes as she looked around. Something was wrong. Something wasn’t right. She could feel it in her bones.

“Be careful anyway” Chris warned them as he took out the lightsaber which caught Isaac’s attention.

He frowned and stepped over to Chris. “I thought you used those only on werewolves” Isaac murmured. That’s when Stella understood what was wrong. Chris agreed to let them save him too easily and he included everyone in his plan. That wasn’t something he would do. Not after Victoria.

Not after everything.

While Stella screamed “Watch out!” as loud as she could, looking at Isaac; Chris said “I do” and pressed the lightsaber on Isaac, causing him drop on the floor with gasp as the electricity moved around on his body. Allison and Stella didn’t even have a chance to react as they looked down at their friend. Chris quickly drop the lightsaber to the ground and walked over to the girls. He handcuffed Allison, turned it around the metal bars and then handcuffed Stella with the other and, trapping them together as they looked at Chris in shock and terror.

“What the hell are you doing?” Allison yelled, knotting anxiously.

“I’m sorry” Chris responded, looking at his daughter. He genuinely was sorry as he looked at the girls. He exhaled and continued, his gaze on Stella. “That’s why I didn’t want to bring you here in the first place. You had enough of guilt.” Argent sighed and brushed back the hair in front of Stella’s face and tucked it in behind her ear in a sincere motion. “You are an excellent Argent, Stella but sometimes even the best of us… We make mistakes. Sometimes, we even lose.” Stella was looking at her uncle, frowning with her lips partly open. Her heart was beating faster, and she was scared of what was about to happen. Chris took a step back to look at them at the same time. “You’re just gonna have to trust me on this.” He turned around and held his gun in his hands. “I knew for a long time she didn’t just operate on the currents. She was in sync with them.” He walked few steps away from the girls before he looked them. He dropped his gun to the floor. Allison and Stella tried to pull themselves away, try to free themselves but failed. The attempts only hurt their wrists more as they were forced to watch Chris. 

That’s when the gate to the vault opened wide and Jennifer walked in with a smile. “Now this is a sacrifice” she announced, grinning. Stella could hear the dramatic scary music and the scream inside her brain as she closed her eyes, not to watch Chris get taken away from them.

When she opened them back on, Chris was nowhere to be seen and there was only wind in his place.

Finally, Isaac got off from the ground and was the one who saved them from the handcuffs. Allison was murmuring something to Isaac but Stella couldn’t listen that much. She couldn’t focus. She was still in shock after what Chris did and what he planned. That’s why without any reaction or warning, she slowly started walking away like she was in some sort of trance. She could hear Isaac and Allison calling out after her, but she didn’t stop until she reached the parking lot. She got inside her car that she followed them here with. She had no idea where she was going to go but she started her car, thinking maybe her powers could lead her to Chris and maybe she could find a way to save Chris but she just couldn’t turn off her brain as she drove around the town.

She remembered what her uncle said. _Even the best of us… We make mistakes. Sometimes even we lose…_

She pulled over when she felt the familiar and sudden panic inside her body. The minute she stopped the engine, she started punching the wheel back to back, each time getting harder and stronger. She tried to cool off, tried not to cry. She tried to ease the panic that was building up fast because she knew they were almost running out of time. Jennifer was going to give sacrifices, if not today, tomorrow the latest. And her sacrifices were going to be Melissa who’s always been so nice to her and made her feel like she was home; Sheriff who always helped her, ever since her first visit even with her criminal record which wasn’t that bright and then her uncle… The guy who was like a father to her after all those years she spent without a father. He was always there, standing up for her.

And Stella cried…

She cried with actual tears streaming down on her face for the first time in forever. She placed her arms on the wheel and her head on her arms. She sobbed, cried and gasped her shoulders moving in sync with her pain. She just… let it all out with her panic attack and tears. She let herself be weak for a while, for the first time she she forbit it for herself. And then, in a second, she straightened up and looked in the rearview. She wiped away the tears, cleaned her messed up make-up before refreshed herself and then as she looked at the mirror, her mask was back on.

She started to engine with a deep breath and drove to school to find the others, especially Stiles so that they could come up with a plan. She sighed and left the weak one in the middle of the road behind her, in her rearview and moved on with her way with a stronger version of herself.

Or she hoped she did. 

Peter walked towards Derek who was sitting down on the couch next to the bed Cora was laying on unconsciously, still with her eyes closed. His worried green eyes were looking down at Cora, thinking about how much he didn’t want to lose her. He didn’t want his little sister to die but he didn’t know a way that could save her either.

Meanwhile Peter pulled his hands away from his lips and moved them down to his chest as he crossed his arms in front of him. “I can understand not seeing a downside to this, as you haven’t exactly been the Alpha of the year…” Peter said while Derek’s eyes found their way to him. He lifted his head up and looked back at his nephew. Derek sighed and let his concerned gaze find Cora again. Peter continued. “… but think about what else you’d be losing.”

“I don’t care about power” Derek said, not looking away from Cora for even a second. Nothing was more important than her at the moment. Nothing. He just wanted to protect his sister, save her. Derek shook his head as he continued softly, feeling Peter’s gaze on him. “Not anymore.”

“What about the power to fight back?” Peter asked, knotting his eyebrows. Power was probably the only thing that Peter cared about. Okay, maybe not the only thing but it was definitely the most important thing of them all. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but Kali’s ultimatum still stands. The full Moon is tomorrow night, and if you couldn’t beat her as an alpha, how do you think you’re gonna fear as a beta?”

Derek turned his head to look at Peter. His green eyes were flickering with a strong emotion but not in a bad way. It wasn’t defeat. It was dedication and focus, only to save Cora. “I don’t care” he said, stopping on every word. 

“What if this was exactly what Jennifer was hoping for?” Peter asked, continuing. “She would know the only way for you to save Cora would be giving up your power.” The girl on the bed was covered in sweats. She was moving without even knowing and murmuring in pain. Her eyes were still closed. “Maybe that’s what she was gonna have you to do at the hospital.”

“Why?” Derek asked, looking back at Peter.

“So that you wouldn’t be able to face the alphas without her” Peter said toughly. “She wants you to come to her. It’s all part of her little seduction, and she’s still seducing you.” He was underlining every word in his sentences with his voice. Derek turned to look back at Cora, hearing Peter again in his ears. “She wants you on her side.”

“Aiden’s not answering any of my texts and I can’t get a hold of Stella” Lydia informed Stiles as she was going down the stairs with him by her side. She was wearing a blue dress today and there was rope mark on her throat, thanks to Jennifer and her attempt of killing her with it. But this morning, when she looked at it as she was getting ready… She didn’t feel like covering that up. She was proud of herself for surviving when someone tried to kill her.

She didn’t need to hide that.

“Neither of them texted me back” Lydia continued as she kept walking but then noticed the way Stiles stopped moving in the middle of the hallway, hearing what she said. In sync with him, Lydia stopped walking as well, turned around and looked at him as they both stood near the stairs. She could tell that Stiles was pretty nervous and she couldn’t blame him. He didn’t have much time to save his father.

Stiles looked behind him, looked around and then back at Lydia, shifting his weight from one leg to another nervously. She dropped her shoulders and continued, seeing the look on his face. She sighed. “Okay, well, maybe we could just… we could go over there and…” Lydia had to stop talking when she heard the sound Stiles’ phone, letting them know there was a new text message. Stiles took out his phone and then read what was written. Immediately, his heart started pounding inside her chest, producing panic and anxiety. His expression changed quickly. The panic rose inside him while Lydia opened her lips. She felt heart picking up its pace as well, noticing Stiles’ anxiety. “What?” she asked, seeing the way his hands started to shake. She took a step forward, towards Stiles. “Oh God, what is it now?”

Stiles pressed his lips together, trying to gulp down the anxiety. “It’s from Isaac.” He paused to take a deep breath, to get rid of the anxiety but he couldn’t do it. His heart still kept beating faster and faster. “Jennifer, she t… she has Allison’s dad” he managed to say. “She took him. And Stella… they don’t know where Stella is. Isaac said… he said that she just took off.” He paused, trying to catch his breath but there was something squeezing his chest, making him unable to breath properly. “She’s got all three now.” He tried to put his phone back to his pocket as he was looking at Lydia, but his vision was too blurry for him to see straight. His hands, his whole body were shaking like crazy with the rising panic inside him as it also caused him to have troubled and shallow breathing.

“There’s still time” Lydia said, trying to calm him down, but Stiles was in no shape to listen to her. His vision was out and on. His head was spinning. His heart was pounding. He was trying to control his breathing but he wasn’t able to. “There’s still time, right?” Stiles hold up his finger, asking for a second. His breathing got faster and irregular. He could hear Lydia like she was talking to him from the other side of a tunnel. “Stiles? Are you okay?” Her voice echoed in his ears as he turned around. He tried to walk but stumbled, his gaze moving around. “What is it? What’s wrong?” Stiles turned around again, facing Lydia. Her voice kept echoing in his ear as his world kept spinning around him. His heart pounded a lot faster. He heard Lydia again, screaming his name as she was trying to reach him. “Stiles!”

“I think… I think I’m having a panic attack” he managed to say, his hand on his chest as he was trying to take a deep breath in. Lydia’s worry grew faster as she looked at his face, not knowing what to do.

So, she did the only thing she could think of.

She pulled him away from the crowd and led him inside to the first room she noticed and she knew it was empty. “Okay” she said as they stepped inside the locker room. She threw their bags onto the floor. She held Stiles by the arm and led him towards a locker, helping him walk in his state of panic. “Come on. Come on.” She kept holding onto him but when he didn’t have the strength or air to do stand on his feet anymore, he fell down on his knees and Lydia quickly followed him down, sat on her knees in front of him. Her green eyes found her friend’s face as she felt very concerned for him. She knew she had anxiety but she never witnessed him having a panic attack before. She wanted to help. She wanted to do something that would get him out of his panic state but she didn’t know how to. She took a deep breath and parted her lips, looking at Stiles. “Just try to think about something else. Anything else” she instructed. It was the only thing she could think of.

Stiles let out small gasps, in attempt of trying to breath. He was looking down but he was able to hear her. “Like what?” he managed to ask.

“Happy things!” Lydia said quickly. She wasn’t really used to seeing him like that. Stiles was always the funny one, always the one who got them out of situations when no one knew what to do. And now? He needed help and Lydia didn’t know what to do. “Good things! Friends, family…” As soon as she realized the word left her mouth, Lydia gasped and tightened every muscle on her face. Stiles immediately lifted his head up and looked at her, shallowly breathing. His wide-open hazel eyes were definitely full with panic as he looked at her in disbelief. Lydia curled her fingers into a fist and softly hit the floor as she cursed at herself. “Oh, I mean, not family. Oh God. Okay.” She looked back at her friend, breathing fast. “Okay, uh, just… Try to… Try to slow down you breathing.”

Stiles kept gasping and breathing fast. “I-I can’t” he said. “I can’t.” His hand was on his chest, moving up and down with the shallow breaths.

Lydia quickly grabbed Stiles’ face with her hands and looked directly in his hazel eyes. “Stiles, look at me. Look at me” she said, slowly and softly rubbing Stiles’ face with her thumbs. “Shh. Look at me.” She paused, looked at the man in front of him who was having a serious panic attack. A small piece of knowledge creeped into her head as she softly whispered. “Stiles.”

And then all of a sudden, she smashed her lips against his. 

Stiles held her breath with a reflex. Lydia closed her eyes the second their lips touched. Stiles’ eyes followed later as he took a moment to process what was happening. Lydia’s fingers slid down to his chin and as she pulled away slowly, not opening her eyes just yet, she was just as surprised as Stiles was and when she finally opened her green eyes back, she noticed the way Stiles was looking at her. She looked at him back, not even knowing he was dreaming about this moment ever since third grade.

Stiles tried to speak up, his lips were shaking and not with panic this time. He swallowed hard, still in shock but the panic was gone. This was what confused him the most. “Uh… how did you do that?” he managed to ask with a low and soft voice.

“I, uh…” Lydia’s voice also came out like a whisper. She slowly licked her lips, made them wetter with her heart pounding inside her chest. It beat faster with a feeling that she wasn’t sure of or didn’t know what to call but she gave it to the heat of the moment because their faces were still closer to each other as they looked into their eyes. “I read once that… holding your breath could stop a panic attack.” Her eyes were wide open, showing how green they were and still locked on Stiles’ face, more on his hazel eyes. “So… when I kissed you…” Her tongue went over her upper lip. “… You held your breath.” 

“I did?” Stiles asked weakly. He still couldn’t believe what happened and he was still trying to get over the panic attack even though he felt calm at the moment. His eyes were locked on Lydia’s who was slowly forming a soft smile on her beautiful face.

“Yeah, you did” she answered with a whisper, pressed her lips together.

Stiles tightened his lips, twisting them down in a way like a child. “Thanks” he murmured. Even though his gaze fell down to Lydia’s pink soft lips for a moment, it went up to her eyes again in a heartbeat. “Really smart.”

Lydia chuckled. As her hands moving nervously, she sat on the floor in relief, instead of on her knees. Stiles stretched his legs, trying to relax as he looked at Lydia. “I just… I don’t know. I just read it somewhere” she responded nervously. “And if I was really smart, I would tell you to sign up for a few sessions with a guidance counselor.”

They laughed softly at her comment but Stiles suddenly stopped, finally leaving the panic behind and straightened up with the thought. “Morell.”

When she finally arrived at school, she stopped in the middle of the hallway and finally thought about what else she could do. Maybe before she should find Stiles, she should have been talking to Morell. That son of a bitch seemed to know everything and maybe even more. She thought about the Argent graffiti on the elevator. That’s why she started walking towards the guidance counselor’s office and when she saw Stiles and Lydia in front of it, ready to go in, she was surprised but not shocked. They must have thinking about the same thing as them.

“Where were you?” Stiles asked right away when he spotted Stella, walking towards them. His hand stopped on the door handle and he looked at the young girl. “Isaac texted us saying they have no idea where you went.”

Stella pressed her lips together, she nodded and then looked at Stiles. “I just, uh, I just needed too clear my head” she responded, not wanting to think about the mini panic attack she had in the car.

Meanwhile Stiles noticed the wetness underneath her eyes and he decided not to push it. “You came here to talk to Morell, right?” Stiles asked, diverting the conversation. Stella nodded him as a confirmation. Seeing that, Stiles’ gaze moved to Lydia and then he opened the door with the girls behind him, he stepped inside. There was no one inside the office, other than one black student sitting in the chair but there was no sign of Morell. Stiles turned to the student. “Are you here for Ms. Morell?”

The girl rolled her eyes and then looked at Stiles. “No, I thought it was gym class” she replied sarcastically.

Lydia looked at her with a fake grin. “Sweetheart, we’re not in the mood for funny” she told her, causing her to break the teasing smile on her face but kept looking at Lydia anyway. “Do you know where she is?”

“If I did, I wouldn’t be waiting here for 20 minutes” the girl said with annoyance as she opened her arms to both sides. Then, she pointed the door with her head. “So how about you three back out the door and wait your turn?”

Stella rolled her eyes. “We’re not here for a session” she said angrily.

“Well, I am” the girl answered, looking at her this time. “And I’ve got some serious issues to work on.”

“Hey, wait, wait” Stiles said as he noticed something looking at her. A memory slid into his brain. “You’re Danielle. You’re Heather’s best friend.”

“I was Heather’s best friend” Danielle corrected him. “We’ve been working on that issue three times a week.”

Stella immediately remembered. Heather was murdered, she was one of the first sacrifices. And it was only understandable that this girl Danielle was having hard times dealing with that, but Stella had no time to deal with any more human emotions. She was already dealing with enough of her own. Well… ignoring it till goes away or hits you harder wasn’t exactly the ideal dealing method but… That was the one she used.

“Hold on” Lydia said as she noticed something that Danielle said few seconds ago. She quickly turned to look at her, continued. “Did you say Ms. Morell’s 20 minutes late?”

“And I don’t know why either” Danielle confirmed her. “She’s always on time.”

Lydia quickly turned her head to look at Stella and Stiles. “I was seeing her at the beginning of the semester” she said, shaking her head. “She was never late.”

“Then she’s not late” Stiles responded, frowned. “She’s missing.”

“What if we are not the only ones who think she knows something?” Lydia murmured, looking at her friends.

Stella licked her lips and she nodded. “Then I want to know what she knows” she said and then quickly walked over to Ms. Morell’s desk. She started going through the drawers in the hopes of finding something in them.

Seeing what she was doing, Danielle leaned forward on her chair, looking at Stella. “What are you doing?” Danielle yelled, asking.

“Trying to find her” Stella murmured as a response, her eyes moving on the stuff that she found inside the drawers. She had a lot of them and she needed help. She knew Lydia wouldn’t probably help her with that, so she lightly lifted her head up and looked at Stiles through her long eyelashes. “And you’re gonna help me.” She pointed a cabinet in the room. “Check that drawer.”

Stiles acted quickly and walked over to the drawer Stella pointed as they heard Danielle’s protesting voice again. “Those files are private” she said.

“Yeah, she’s kind of right” Lydia agreed with her as she nodded, looking at her friends with her fingers curled up in a fist, holding it up near her chest.

“It ain’t my first rodeo, Martin” Stella said, forming a soft grin on her face. Her gaze moved from Lydia to drawers again in seconds. She went through few files and then found one. Lydia Martin… She put the yellow file in the air to show her friend. “This one’s yours, by the way.”

“Let me see that” she said quickly, grabbing the file from Stella’s hands. She stepped back to her place and started flipping through the pages, looking between them and what Morell wrote about her.

Stiles frowned as he shook his head, noticing something else that seemed a little bit weird to be caught his attention by. “Wait, Lydia, that’s your drawing” he said when Stella sighed in defeat. She quickly stood up, not being able to find anything else that seemed important. She walked behind Stiles to stand right next to Lydia to look at the drawing.

“Yeah, I know” Lydia said. “It’s a tree.”

“Yeah, good too” Danielle said, liking what she saw. Lydia thanked her with a smile.

“No” he said, taking a big step towards Lydia. “But that’s the same one, though.”

“Same as what?” Lydia asked in confusion. She was looking back and forth between Stella and Stiles.

“The same one I always see you drawing in class” Stiles answered. In a normal situation, Stella would chuckle at the fact that he was watching Lydia during classes but she could see what he was talking about so she shook her head and chose to focus on their problem.

“It’s a tree” Lydia said softly, calmly and slowly, like it wasn’t a big deal. “I like drawing trees.”

“Oh, God” Stella murmured, brushing her hair back and then walked over to Lydia to stand closer so she could show her. “Yeah, okay, but it’s the exact same one.” Stella instantly remembered the trees that Lydia has been drawing since the start of the semester, just like she was doing.

Stiles reached out for Lydia’s bag and pulled out her notebook and showed every page, every tree drawing to Lydia. They were exactly the same as before, like copy paste. Hundreds and hundreds of them. Small trees, big trees… It was always the same tree.

“Okay, you can have my session” Danielle said after seeing the same drawing one page from one and another. “You got bigger issues.” She grabbed her bag and before she got out of the room, she looked Lydia from the corner of her eyes.

As she left the room and left them alone, Stiles still kept flipping through the pages, causing Lydia to take a breath full of fear. “What is this?” she asked in terror as Stiles paused with a thought popped up in his head, making him to turn to look at Stella.

“You’ve been drawing something like that too” he murmured in hurry. “In chemistry class, the one Jennifer came as a substitute.”

“Yeah, but…” Stella stopped in the middle of her sentence, closing her eyes and thinking. She took a deep breath and she turned the notebook around. Lydia’s tree suddenly became a very large tree root. She softly licked her lips. “None of them meant anything until I looked at them upside down.” Stella remembered her tree and her screaming face and the age circles inside the tree drawings she’s done and softly tapped on the drawing. “I know where they are” she said.

Stiles sighed. “Nemeton” he murmured. “That’s where she’s keeping them. It has to be.”

“Makes sense” Stella murmured as they walked out of the office. “It was the power of Nemeton that gave her the strength and power to stay alive when Kali ripped her apart, right? Also, I remember you telling me something about Derek and his high school sweetheart Paige. The thing that gave Nemeton the power was Derek killing here there when the werewolf venom didn’t work for her, right?” She let out a breath after Stiles nodded to confirm her. “And now she wants to give her last sacrifices there.” She threw her head back, exposing her neck and looking up the ceiling. “How poetic.”

Right when Stiles was about say something, they all heard something else. “Stilinski!” someone said, making them to look at the direction that they heard him talk from. They saw a tall man in a suit, making his way towards them. Even Stella knew who that was from the resemblance and Stiles’ expression.

It wasn’t so hard to guess that the FBI agent was Scott’s father.

“Ugh…” Stiles rolled his eyes and then turned to look at Stella and Lydia. “Alright, look” he said, trying to come up with a plan in his mind and thinking about what he was going to tell Scott about him. “Go to Derek, okay? He and Peter… they’ve been there before, so they’ll know where it is. Tell them it’s the root cellar, alright? They’ll know.”

Stella and Lydia nodded and quickly walked away to get to Stella’s black car together, leaving Stiles behind to deal with the tallest McCall.

The door slid open and Lydia and Peter paused for a moment as they looked at each other in silence. Stella could feel the tension and the anger like it was something that could be touched. After all, Peter was the one who cornered her on the lacrosse field, bit her and left her there bleeding, which gave the powers Lydia had at the moment.

Lydia sighed. “You” she murmured.

“Me” Peter responded.

“You.”

Peter avoided eye contact as he repeated. “Me.” He took a deep breath and looked behind him over his shoulder. “Derek, we have visitors.”

Lydia was looking at him like if she could, she would kill him and leave him there in agony. Stella moved her eyebrows at the tension and she walked inside the loft with Lydia behind her.

“You don’t know where it is?” Lydia asked curiously and in disbelief, raising her eyebrows. Her green eyes moving on Derek and Peter as she continued. “But Stiles said you’ve been there.”

“We have” Peter responded without looking at her. His arms were in front of his chest folded and his chin was resting on his fist as he continued. “But after a few memorable experiences there, Talia… Derek’s mother and my older sister… decided that she didn’t ever want us going back. She knew how dangerous it was and took the memory of its location from us.”

“Okay, can me and Lydia find that place through our powers?” Stella said, sitting next to Derek on the couch as she lifted her head up to look at Peter. Her gaze moved on Lydia and then to Derek who was looking down on Cora. The poor girl didn’t look like she was getting any better.

“No” Derek murmured, looking at Stella for few seconds. His green eyes flickered with concern and worry for his sister as he continued. “Even your powers can’t be strong enough to find a place like that.”

“But then how are we supposed to find it?” Lydia asked curiously and in hurry. Peter shook his head, telling them that he had no idea. As his eyes moved onto Cora, worrying about her, Stella found herself sighing in defeat.

“It has to be on telluric current” Stiles said. After understanding Peter and Derek weren’t going to be able to help them with this, Stella and Lydia drove to the vet clinic. Stiles told the girls to meet them there so that they could at least try to come up with a plan that would save their parents and everyone else since it would stop the strength that Jennifer was channeling from them. But they didn’t even know where the hell this Nemeton was supposed to be. “Or maybe even at the axis of two or where they all intersect. I just know it’s where Derek took Paige to die.”

“My dad and Gerard were there once” Allison said, putting her hands on the table. Stella pressed her lips together into a straight line. She pushed herself off the wall she was resting against and nervously started pacing around in the small room. “But Gerard said it was years ago, and he couldn’t remember where it was.” She went to see the old man today on her own to ask him about it but she got nothing. “And my dad obviously isn’t here to tell us now.”

“Yeah, mine either” Stiles murmured, looking down at his hands nervously, worrying about his dad even more now. He took a deep breath in, tried to focus to find a plan that will get his father back.

“Then how do we find this place?” Isaac asked frustratedly and curiously.

Stella took a deep breath and let it out between her lips as she waggled her eyebrows. “I don’t want you guys to think I’m being pessimist or anything, but I can’t… I can’t see any way out of this” she said, causing Allison to roll her eyes at her in a way of saying that this is the last thing they needed. Stella shrugged but as she noticed the look on Deaton’s face, like everybody else, she looked at him who was looking at the blank like he knew something.

“There might be away” he said, all of a sudden. Stella noticed something she hated in Deaton’s voice tone. She also noticed that Deaton hated this one as well but at the same time, they had no choice and no other way. Everybody knew that at that point. “But it’s dangerous.”

“Did we expect any other way?” Stella snarled at Deaton sarcastically.

The doctor looked at the teenagers with a sigh as he decided not to say anything to Stella’s comment and parted his lips. “We’re gonna need Scott.”

Stiles waited, standing in front of his blue jeep with Deaton by his side as they watched Scott walk towards them with his hands in his pocket. He came over to them, stood right in front of them, took a deep breath and asked, curiously, under his breath. “How’d you guys find out?”

Stiles’ hands were in his pocket due to cold air like Scott, but both had different expressions on their faces. Stiles was still a little hurt because Scott went with Deucalion. “Lydia and Stella” he softly answered with a slight head nod, looking at Scott. “You?”

“Morell” Scott responded, looking at his best friend. “None of the other alphas know where it is either.” Hearing that, Stiles’ gaze moved to Deaton who was looking at them, listening them with his hands in his black jacket’s pocket.

As Stiles asked “So if this works, are you gonna tell them?” curiously, his eyes found Scott again.

Scott slowly nodded, he lifted his head up from the ground and looked at his friend. “I can’t stop Jennifer without them” he responded.

“How about we concentrate on finding your parents first?” Deaton asked, moving his eyes on Stiles and then on Scott.

Scott slowly nodded as a response and then turned to look at his boss. “What’s the plan?”

“Essentially, you, Allison and Stiles need to be surrogate sacrifices for your parents and during this process, Stella needs to be with you through her own powers to wake you up with her scream” Deaton explained. Stiles nodded, knowing the plan already as Scott raised his eyebrows and his lips partly opened in shock.

“We die for them?” he asked curiously.

“But he can bring us back” Stiles responded to calm Scott down. But then as he wanted an insurance of his own, he turned to look at Deaton. “You can… You can bring us back, right?”

“You remember the part where I said it was dangerous?” Deaton asked, looking at him. As Stiles rolled his eyes, Deaton continued on explaining the plan that was probably gonna end up bad but also probably won’t but they couldn’t think about it since it was the only plan they had. “If it goes right, all three of you will be dead for a few seconds. Even Stella in theory… but there’s something else you need to think about.” Deaton’s eyes were moving back and forth between Stiles and Scott as he continued. “This is a dangerous thing for more reasons than one.” He raised up his finger as he started listing. “You’ll be giving power back to the Nemeton, a place that hasn’t had power for a very long time.” Scott realized what they were dealing with as he closed his eyes and sighed. He could guess the outcomes of this. “This kind of power is like a magnet. It attracts the supernatural, the kind of things that a family like Argents can fill the pages of a bestiary with.” Stiles took a deep breath anxiously. “It will draw them here, like a beacon.”

Stiles frowned as he looked at the doc. “Doesn’t sound any worse than anything we’ve already seen” he murmured.

Hearing that, Deaton looked at Stiles. He knew this was definitely not a joke. “You’d be surprised at what you have yet to see” he responded.

“Is that it?” Scott asked, slightly raising his eyebrows. Deaton looked at Scott, hearing his question with an expression that said this: I wish it was…

“No” he answered him. “It’ll also have an effect on the four of you. Stella may not feel it the way you guys are going to but she will feel it.” He took a deep breath before he continued. “You won’t be able to see it, but you’ll feel it every day for the rest of your lives.”

Scott slowly raised his eyebrows. He looked down with a thought in his head. “Like a Tattoo.”

“It’s gotta be now” Derek said, looking at Cora who was suffering and squirming in pain and probably living her last minutes. She was laying down on the bed with her eyes closed and sweat drops on her forehead and around her wet hair. Peter was pacing in the loft, also looking at the young Hale. “I don’t have a choice.”

“You always have a choice” Peter said. He definitely didn’t want him to give up on being an alpha that easily. Not at a time like this. “It’s whether or not you can live with the consequences…” Peter looked at Derek and continued. “… facing Kali as a Beta.”

“But it’s not just a full Moon that’s coming” Derek said with his eyes locked on Cora, not losing the contact even for a second. “It’s a lunar eclipse. We’ll be all powerless.”

“Alright,” Deaton said as they finished filling up the bathtub with ice cubes and water. He looked at the three of them. “What did you bring?” he asked as they all needed to bring something personal to their parents and die with them, otherwise it wouldn’t work according to Deaton.

“Um, I got my dad’s badge” Stiles said, starting first. He rubbed the badge with his thumb and then raised it up in the air slightly to show it to them and then put it back down as he continued with a soft voice. “Jennifer kind of crushed it in her hand, so I tried hammering it out a bit. Still doesn’t look great.”

Deaton softly smiled, looking at Stiles. “Well, it doesn’t need to look good, if it has meaning” he said, trying to calm the young man down a little bit, trying to assure him. Stiles nodded and Deaton turned to look at Allison.

Before he could call Allison’s name, Isaac opened her lips softly, curiously. “Is that an actual silver bullet?” he asked, looking at the little thing Allison was holding in her hand. Stella let out a soft and a broken smile as she looked at the silver bullet.

“My dad made it” Allison explained with a thoughtful expression. “It’s kind of a ceremonial thing. When one of us finishes learning all the skills to be a hunter, we forge a silver bullet as a testament to the code.” She squeezed the bullet in her hand as Deaton turned to look at Scott.

“Scott?” he said, waiting for his answer.

“My dad got my mom this watch when she first got hired at the hospital” Scott explained as he opened his fingers to show them a beautiful, brown leather watch. “She used to say it was the only thing in their marriage that ever worked.”

“Okay.” Deaton took a deep breath, parted his lips. “The three of you will get in” he started and then looked at Stella. “And Stella, you…”

Stella’s hand moved up in the hair like it wasn’t important. “I’ll make myself feel at home” she said with stolidity, trying to hide her anxiety. She continued as she wrinkled up her nose. “I just… I don’t know if I can control this, though.” She tightened her lips and pulled her shoulders up in an innocent way. “I’ve never done this before.” The minute she said that, she felt Isaac’s hand on her back as a support, making her to turn and look at him.

Isaac quickly moved his hand to her back, held her in a supportive way, causing her to turn and look at him as he spoke. “You can do this” he assured her. He trusted and believed in Stella, making her to smile softly.

She took a deep breath and turned Deaton for him to continue going over the plan, she pressed her lips together. “Okay, the three of you will get in” he continued. “Each of us will hold you down until you’re essentially… Well, dead. But it’s not just someone to hold you under. It needs to be someone who can hold you back.” As Allison and Lydia smiled at each other, Deaton already knew which pairing would make the perfect sense objectively. “Lydia” he said, causing her to stop moving and look at him with confusion. “You go with Stiles.” Stiles’ gaze moved towards Lydia, watched her smile at himself softly and nodded.

But Allison felt her heart picking its pace. “Are you sure?” Allison asked, making everybody to look at her. “I mean, Stella is going to be with us and Scott and I have to go underwater.” Stella found herself looking at her cousin. She was practically telling her cousin with her eyes to not make this any harder for any of them because she knew Allison and Isaac were getting closer, they started to get along well.

And she wasn’t the only one who knew that, who saw that.

Deaton looked back and forth between Allison and Isaac, giving them the message but Isaac and Allison were looking at Scott, almost with guilty eyes but Scott managed to force a smile on his face, looking at them. “It’s okay” he whispered in a way that it was too heartbreaking because Stella knew it wasn’t okay at all. Scott was Allison’s first love as much as Allison was Scott’s and they were broken up but Isaac was still their mutual friend.

Everything was just… too messed up.

Scott tried to gulp down the feeling and the sadness inside him as he walked over to the tub, not making eye contact with any of them. Stella noticed the emotion in his eyes but as they had no time to think or talk about anything, she sat down on the chair with a deep exhale. Deaton walked over to Stella and tied her up so that when she was doing her own thing, when she was in a trance, she wouldn’t go anywhere. Stella smiled at him, telling him that everything was okay. She silently thanked him.

Meanwhile, everyone walked to their separate tubs that they were going to… well, die.

All three slowly stepped into the cold water while Stella watched them from her seat. They were all shivering due to cold water and ice. Deaton, Isaac and Lydia took their places behind the tubs as well when Stiles turned his head to look at Scott. “By the way…” he said, his voice shattering which was another clue of how cold the water they were in was. “If I don’t make it back and you do, you should probably know something.” He took a breath and then told him the news. “Your dad is in town.”

Stella watched Stiles turn his head away from Scott not to see his reaction and then she saw Deaton nodding at her, telling her that it was time. All four them exchanged a concerned look for one last time. Then, Stella closed her eyes and hearing the water splashes in the back, knowing that Deaton and the others were pushing them and keeping them down underwater.

She took a deep breath and then as she opened her eyes back to whole different room, she loudly exhaled .


	12. LUNAR ECLIPSE

Stella opened her brown eyes to a white room again, but this time it was a lot more different than the one she found herself in during her own hallucinations. For starters, she wasn’t alone this time. There were Scott, Stiles and Allison with her. And second of all, the room wasn’t exactly white. It looked like a very bright room instead of the ones in her hallucinations.

She looked around but then quickly turned to her back when the others pulled themselves out of the tub, out of the water as they gasped for air. All three stepped outside and then they all looked at each other in confusion. Allison’s eyes found Stella who she was very concerned about but as they just stood there and looking at each other, none of them said anything. They took a deep breath and swallowed hard anxiously.

Stella took a step forward and peeked over her shoulder to look at her friends but paused as she noticed something else. She turned her whole body to really look at what it was. She narrowed down her eyes, took another step forward as the rest of time as she noticed that it was a big, really big, enormous kind of big root.

Stella immediately knew what it exactly was as they all stepped towards it, towards The Nemeton.

Scott frowned as they stood right near it, seeing something else on it. He looked at the circles on the middle, then his hand found his tattoo. Allison, Stiles and Stella’s gaze were on him, watching him quietly as he sighed. Stella’s tongue moved on her lips, she exhaled and walked closer to the root. She knotted her eyebrows, her lips partly open and as she took another deep breath, she touched the wood.

At first, she didn’t know where she was. One minute she was in the white, weird room and the other minute the whole environment changed around her. She thought she was having another hallucination again as she looked around in her first moments of trying to adapt to the situation.

But then she remembered. She remembered what they were doing and managed to think of looking around her.

Stella took a deep breath, stood up from the bed she was sitting on and with the company of her pounding heart, she moved her eyes around in the room. There was a bed in front of the window that she was standing near to. It had a Pegasus linen set which looked a lot familiar to the young Argent. There was a bookcase, near the foot side of the bed and a white desk near it. There were more books on the white desk. Coloring books, story books and some colorful pens. It was simple as that and even though, it didn’t look like it, Stella knew it belonged to a child because she also noticed the toy box near the door, few inches away from her. She saw the teddy Bear on the bed and the little animal thingies on the desk.

As she looked around, she noticed another furniture. A dusty yet very familiar mirror, attached to the wall near the door, right above the toy box.

She drew her eyebrows together and took a step forward towards the mirror. Somehow, she felt like she lost control of her body. She didn’t know why she had to go look into that mirror. She just knew she had to. 

And as she stood right in front of it and looked at her reflection, she felt like she had a minor heart attack in the spot. Her eyes opened widely as her heart picked up its pace. Her gaze moved on her reflection and then looked down at her hands, flexing them open. They looked normal which gave her another reason to panic and then her gaze moved to her reflection on the mirror once again.

Everything could be considered normal except for the fact that she looked younger, smaller and shorter in the mirror. She was back to her age 6 as far as she could see in the mirror. Her long brown hair was tied up in high ponytail. She had lilac long-sleeved shirt and purple black sweatpants on which was a color she hadn’t wear in a very long time.

Her gaze moved on herself again, her real self as far as she could see. Her brown hair was released on her shoulders, reaching to her waist. She had a black leather jacket, white shirt and black jeans on with her black Dr. Martin boots and she was sure that she had a natural makeup on.

As her eyes found her 6-year-old reflection in the mirror, she gasped in fear. Her frightened gaze moved around in the room, her feet walked around in the room and then it suddenly it her. Everything here was just too familiar because this room used to be her room. This room was in the house she was born in. This was the house that she’s lived for 7 years before they moved away from Beacon Hills.

She frowned more but then freaked out more as she heard someone calling out her name from downstairs. “Stella!” a woman voice shouted, a little dazed off. She startled as she turned her head towards the door. She felt like her chest was being squeezed as she tried to breath. She knew who it was. She couldn’t believe she could hear her again as her feet carried her outside the room. She walked towards the stairs and then heard her again. “I’m just… I’m just trying to protect you, damn it!”

Stella found herself frowning more. She heard what she said but she understood nothing from it.

And then something else happened that freaked her out even more. Her mouth opened without her will and yelled out one word in a question. “Mom?” Stella asked as her feet carried her down the stairs, like she had no control over her body anymore. “Mom, is that you?”

“I have to do this” Kate kept mumbling to herself, making absolutely no sense to Stella. Her voice came out like a whisper, making it barely audible to Stella. She gulped down as she took the stairs down, still hearing her mother. Her feet carried her into the living room where her mother was standing in, talking to herself. As she came into her vision, her lips fell apart in shock. She was drunk and her fingers were curled around an almost empty bottle of tequila. She grimaced as Kate’s drunk eyes moved around and then finally found her. Stella kept looking at the tequila bottle. It was the only drink she was always disgusted of and never drink but never knew why. Somehow, she felt like this moment was the reason for it. She exhaled as her eyes moved from the battle to her mother and quickly noticed the Lycaon necklace around her neck. That was the necklace that was found near the remains of the Hale House. It was the reason how she was found guilty in her case.

When she heard Kate’s voice, her brown eyes traveled to her mother’s face. “Ah, you are here, baby?” she asked. Stella’s eyes stayed wide-open, her lips slightly apart in shock. She could smell the tequila off of her and she hated it.

“You… You called me mom” Stella responded innocently. Kate chuckled lightly, feeling the numb in her throat as she tried to gulp down. Stella _knew_ it was a memory as she watched her mother. She could remember the house, remember… The house was the only thing she could remember… As she realized that she let out a slight yet shocked gasp.

Because in that moment, she realized she had no actual memories of her living here in Beacon Hills. She had no memories of her life being here whatsoever. She only remembered the small things that would make sense if she only lived here but most of them felt like dejavu rather than a memory. 

“Ah, yes, I did, didn’t I?” Kate murmured in haze, like she’s just realized that. She put the bottle right next to her as Stella looked at her mother, listened to her off-ly talk. “What were we talking about before I…” _Before you get_ drunk, Stella couldn’t help but think as Kate continued, looking down at her daughter. “… Yes! The absence of your father. You still want to learn about your father, baby?” As she heard what her mother said, Stella forced her mind to remember this memory to find out about what happened. And then she felt like she got the answer. She remembered something a little but not everything. She remembered asking her mother about her father and then she remembered Kate leaving her alone in the house to get drunk.

Stella didn’t know if her mother was always that impulsive, reckless… She probably just got angry that day because Stella asked her about her father. Which was probably the last time because Stella didn’t remember asking Kate about him ever again. Perhaps, this memory was the reason for it.

“N-No” Stella answered, her voice was breaking. Kate smiled with satisfaction but then her smile faded away. Amount of alcohol caused her to lose control and then fell onto the couch with her eyes closed. She didn’t hit anything but as soon as her body met the fabric, she started sleeping.

Stella quickly grabbed the tequila bottle, wrinkling her nose in disgust and put it aside, away from her mother. She placed the blanket on her mother to cover her and then she found herself softly whispering. “I don’t care about who my father is anymore, mommy because you’re all I need” she silently said to her ear. Stella stopped fighting when she realized she had no power over what she was gonna say or do since it was just a memory that she couldn’t remember. She knew she just had to live it until it was over. Stella continued as Kate’s lips curled up to a soft smile, barely hearing what her daughter said. “You’re all I need. You are enough for me.”

But Stella didn’t notice the smile on her face as she turned around to get her some water and aspirin to drink when she woke up. She took a step forward but immediately stumbled, causing her to frown in confusion. 

She looked at the thing underneath her feet, frowned more as she noticed it was part of stem coming out from the floor. Her eyes followed it with her feet moving under and she chased it down to the study. As she saw what it belonged to, she gasped. The desk was cracked, it was a mess inside as Stella’s eyes moved around and finally found the one thing in the center of all these.

The Nemeton, standing in the middle of the study.

Stella found herself in a conflict, struggling as she thought about what she was supposed to do right now. Maybe… just maybe… She could stay here forever with her mom, make things different and maybe… Maybe they could live a happy life. She thought about this option for a long time until she realized this wasn’t her doing. It was the 6-year-old Stella thinking… She took a deep breath and forced every cell in her body to put the water and the pill down on the coffee table. She exhaled loudly, dropped her shoulders alongside it. She thought about Allison, Stiles Scott. She thought about the sheriff, Melissa and Chris. She thought about how they were all depending on her for this. How they needed her scream to wake up.

With that strength, she managed to walk over to the Nemeton and touched cut bole. And then, she just… screamed.

Stella’s loud scream echoed all around the vet clinic as she pulled her hands to herself, easily ripping the ropes off that was tying her up to the chair. The moment Stella was free, the others pulled themselves out of the water with loud gasps. Deaton was the first one to stand up and ran inside as they noticed them coming alive and breathing again. Lydia and Isaac followed them inside, putting their concerned gazes on them. Stiles, Scott and Allison coughed while trying to get the remaining water out of their lungs, trying to get the air they very much needed. Meanwhile Isaac was looking at Stella, wondering how the hell she was able to rip off the ropes as just a human. Stella’s eyes connected with him, knowing exactly what he had in his mind but she ignored him, stood up and swallowed hard.

“I saw it” Scott shouted, announced as he stepped outside the tub. “I know where it is.”

“We passed it” Stiles added, agreeing with him as he continued his story. “There’s… There’s a stomp, this huge tree.” He got out of his own tub as Allison did, kept talking heatedly. “Well, it’s not huge anymore. It was cut down. But it’s still big, though, very big.”

“It was the night we were looking for the body” Scott explained.

“Yeah, the same night you were bitten by Peter” Stiles confirmed him.

“I was there, too, in the car with my mother” Allison said in hurry, still breathing faster than normal that she needed to take the control over it. “We almost hit someone.”

Scott quickly turned to look at Allison in shock. Stella frowned, remembering something of her own, hearing Sheriff’s voice in the back of her mind. “It was me” he said in shock, pointing himself. “You almost hit me.”

Allison gasped in surprise but before anyone could say anything else, Stella frowned and looked at her cousin. “Hold on a second” Stella said, blinking her eyes in confusion of a memory. “When was this?”

“The day before I start Beacon Hills high” Allison answered, trying to understand what Stella was thinking about but then it suddenly hit her. “You- You were in town as well, helping us pack in.”

“Oh, my God” she murmured as she looked back and forth between Stiles, Scott and Allison. “I was there, too. In the woods.” They all stood there in shock, gazing at her as Stella continued, slightly shaking her head and looking at Allison. “You and Victoria went out and Chris wasn’t at home too and I…” She licked her lips, breathing heavily. “I went for a run.”

_**** “Yes, mom, I know but-” Stella murmured with frustration, out of breath. Her heart was pounding after her long yet interrupted jog in the woods. It was almost midnight and Stella knew it was an unusual workout time for anyone else but she just felt too overwhelmed in the house, sitting alone by herself. So, she decided to go for a jog, get some fresh air before she went back to New York in two days._

_But apparently her mother who she didn’t want to talk to right now had some different kind of plans._

_“I’ll be there in two weeks, you know that” Kate insisted, interrupting her daughter smoothly. It’s been a while since she’s seen her and even though the last argument that they had over the phone just few days ago, she really wanted to see her._

_“Yes, I_ do _know that, but you also know that I have to go back to New York” she responded underneath her breath. she sighed before she continued. “I have school and I have presentations and grandma-” Stella would always try to find an excuse to ditch her mother. She didn’t know why she was doing it, maybe she wanted her to feel guilty about God knows what. There was a moment in their life that… Their relationship was never the same or never better since then and Stella had no idea what happened._

_“3 more weeks, Ella” Kate said but this time it sounded like an order. “I’ll talk your principle and I’m sure my sweet mother would understand that I want to see my daughter.”_

_Stella rolled her eyes, knowing Kate wasn’t going to see it. She also knew she wasn’t going to back down and there was no way of changing her mind. “Okay, mother, whatever you say” she said, a little harsher than she intended to. “3 more weeks. See you then.” She hung up the phone before Kate had a chance to say anything else._

_Stella kneeled down, putting her head between her hands as she started taking deep breathes. She would do that whenever she needed to control her emotions, control her anxiety. She was never good with those things as pain, anger and anxiety were the only ones she was used to and when it was something else… She just needed a minute for herself to catch a breath._

_But then she heard a dog barking, startling Stella. She quickly stood up and looked around to see who it was but then she heard someone’s voice, knowing that it was the Sheriff of Beacon Hills after seeing the other cops around with flashlights in their hands. “Hang on, hang on” he shouted. “This little delinquent belongs to me.” Stella knew police being here was never a good sign. She shouldn’t have been here. She knew she had to get out of here._

_Stella looked at the direction sheriff’s voice was heard from. Her eyes caught someone on the ground, a buzzed-cut young man who was probably the Sheriff’s son. As he helped him get up, Stella turned around and this time ran her way to the house. ****_

Stella forced her memory a little further, thinking about that night. “Holy…” she murmured as the whole night came back to her, as she remembered the big log near there. She remembered running past it and not focusing on it a bit. “I know where it is. I saw it on my way back.”

Hearing the story, Scott speedily looked at Deaton, Lydia and Isaac. “We can find it” he said with hope in his voice.

But judging by faces of them, they were not highly happy about this news.

“What?” Allison asked curiously, noticing their expressions.

“You guys were out for a very long time” Isaac started explaining.

“How long is a long time?” Stella asked, knotting her eyebrows as she looked at them.

“16 hours” Deaton answered.

“We’ve been in the water for 16 hours?” Scott asked, raising his voice in shock.

Deaton nodded, confirming them as he pressed his lips together anxiously. And as he opened them back on to talk, his eyes were flickering with worry. “And the full moon rises less than four hours.”

Cora pulled the water away from Derek’s lips as she saw him came to himself. She kept smiling gratefully at her brother who saved her life and gave up being an alpha for her well-being. She watched him open his eyes slowly and notice her near his body on the ground. “You’re okay” he whispered.

Cora’s hands were moving on the back of Derek’s neck softly, lovingly as she kept her gaze on him. “I’m doing much better than you are right now, and all because of you” she responded with a light smile on her face.

“Hopefully not all for nothing” Peter reacted, leaning against the desk. He was standing few steps away from them. He thought he was the only one who was making sense right now. He continued ranting, probably annoying Derek and Cora while being pessimistic. “The moon is rising, Derek. You drained your battery all the way to the red, and there is a fully charged alpha on her way to rip you, limb from limb.”

“I’ll be fine in a few hours” Derek assured him as Cora’s hand went through his sweaty hair. He was tired, out of breath. Cora knew he was worried about her but now it was her time to worry about him as she looked at him concernedly.

“I sincerely hope so” Peter said teasingly, looking at Derek who was looking at him with spaced, tried green eyes. “Because ‘a few hours’ is all that you have.”

“No, dude, you are not going back with them” Stiles opposed as he turned around and looked at him, holding his towel between his hands. Water was dripping down from his wet hair as his anxious gaze moved around on his friends. He definitely wasn’t going to let Scott go back to that predator alpha pack to work with them. He didn’t trust any of them. He didn’t like Aiden and Ethan for so many reasons and Deucalion? That was definitely a hell no from Stiles.

“I made a deal with Deucalion” Scott reminded Stiles with determination, insisting. He was looking at his friends, he was sure about what he was going to do. He knew he had to. 

“Does anyone else think that sounds a lot like a deal with the devil?” Stiles asked furiously, looking around in the room, at their friends’ faces, waiting for them to agree with him. He knew he wasn’t alone on this. He had to.

“Why does it matter anyway?” Isaac asked, curiously raising his eyebrows as he looked at Stiles in return.

Stella rolled her eyes, holding the bridge of her nose as she sighed. “God, Isaac” she murmured, shaking her head in disbelief. Then she lifted her head back up to look at Isaac as she took a breath. “When you make a deal with the devil…” As she referenced to what Stiles said, she pointed him and continued. “… you can’t never not go back.” She waggled her eyebrows. “Read the bestiary. So many crossroad deals ended up bloody and deathly.” She shrugged. “Of course, I am saying all that, considering and thinking and also hoping that Scott doesn’t want to die just yet, so…”

Isaac rolled his eyes at Stella but didn’t say anything. Meanwhile Scott turned to him and parted his lips to answer his question. “Because I still don’t think we can beat Jennifer without their help” he stated, causing Allison to look at Deaton with frustration.

“He trusts you more than anyone” she said, asking him to do something. She also agreed with Stiles, thinking Scott shouldn’t be going back to Deucalion. “Tell him he’s wrong.”

“I’m not so sure he is” doc responded causally and continued as he noticed the way everyone was looking at him, thinking he was out of his mind while agreeing with Scott on this. He took a deep breath. “Circumstances like this sometimes require that you align yourself with the people you’d normally consider enemies.”

“So, we’re gonna trust him” Stella said but it came out like a question as she kept staring at Deaton in disbelief and concern. She softly scoffed, implying that his plane was crazy. “The guy that calls himself death, destroyer of worlds? We’re gonna trust that guy? Are we even that desperate?”

“I wouldn’t trust him, no” Deaton said, looking at her and then explained what he meant to say, his gaze moving on the others. “But you could use him to your advantage. Deucalion may be the enemy, but he could also be the bait.” They all exchanged a confused look within each other, listening to him. They tried to come up with something, find a way out of all this but then as they heard the front door creaking open, their heads turned towards that direction.

Scott acted quicker and was the first one to go after Deaton, follow him to front desk. Stella frowned. She looked at Stiles and the others in confusion and then got confused more when she heard Ethan’s voice with desperation. “I’m looking for Stella” he announced, standing in front of the front door. Because of the mountain ash, he couldn’t move further.

Stella frowned more, hearing her name from Ethan’s lips and let her feet carry her to where Scott and Deaton were. She walked past Lydia and then stopped walking when she could see Ethan, standing next to Scott.

The first thing she’s noticed was the desperation and helplessness in his brown eyes as he looked at her. “Alright, you found her” she said with a distant voice, not trusting him and feeling curious about why he was here. Ethan and she were not friends. They didn’t really like each other and they couldn’t get along that well. There were no extra death glares or threats anymore but that didn’t mean a truce as she kept looking at him and slightly shook her head, raising her eyebrows. “What the hell do you want?”

“I need your help” Ethan said, confusing and making Stella intrigued even more.

In the meantime, Stiles has walked towards to them and put his hand on the wall above Stella as he stood next to her protectively, scowling at Ethan. “With what?” he asked curiously and distantly. Stella and Stiles… they didn’t start their relationship in the best way. Their biggest entertainment was to annoy one and other but as they spent more time together, having most of their classes in common, they’ve grown on each other. They gained the ability to understand each other. Stiles understood what mood Stella was in or what she was feeling and after everything they’ve been through since the term started… He became more protective over her which helped them eventually became really close friends, even best friends.

“Stopping my brother and Kali…” Ethan said, his voice coming out a little lover but still loud enough for them to hear. Stella kept staring at Ethan with one eyebrow raised on her forehead, waited for him to continue as she had no idea what she was supposed to stop him from doing. Ethan exhaled silently and dropped his shoulder, finishing his sentence. “… from killing Derek.”

Stella felt her hands flexing into a fist as she kept her gaze on Ethan. Of course, she was going to help Ethan but something inside her just snapped as she heard what Ethan said. Stopping Aiden from killing Derek… Aiden kept disappointing Stella and she didn’t even realize she was… hoping.

But instead of actually showing her emotions, she found herself saying something else. “Is there a reason why you think I can stop him?” she asked, actually feeling curious about it. “I mean…” She scoffed annoyedly. “What’s up with everyone and their recent obsession about how _Stella can stop Aiden_ or _Stella has an influence on Aiden_?” She looked around, at her friends and Ethan as she continued. “Because I feel kind of lost here.” Her tongue frustratedly moved on her lips and then realized… She didn’t want to know the answer as no one wanted to or had the balls to give her the answer. She quickly shook her head. “You know what?” she shouted. “Never mind. I don’t want to know. I rather be lost.” She crossed her arms in front of her chest and took a step forward, looking at Ethan. “When are we leaving?”

“Does it scare you that much?” Ethan said, taking his eyes off the road for a second to look at Stella. His eyebrows were raised up with the question as he placed his elbow on the open window. They were alone in the car because they planned to go ahead and warn Derek while the others had different plans to find the Nemeton and rescue everyone. As Stella sit in the same car as Ethan, hearing that question and knowing what he meant, she wished to be Lydia who had to go and take care of her mother until she was needed. Stella wanted her to come with them to warn Derek but in the last minute, she got a text. Not wanting her to leave her alone with Ethan, she still gave her her car keys. She promised Stella to be there if she ever needed her and then drive away. That’s why she was alone in the car with Ethan, hearing him talk about the stuff that she didn’t want to listen. Not now… “The thought of someone caring for you, caring about you… Does it really scare you that much?” Stella sighed, deciding not to answer and ignore him as she looked away through the window which practically gave the answer Ethan asked for. He took a deep breath, kept driving the car to the loft. “I get you, okay? I know we don’t like each other but I know my brother. I get him. You guys… You can try but can’t deny the things you-”

Stella quickly looked at Ethan with a sharp expression, telling him to shut up while her hand was still on the back of her neck, interrupting him. “How about you shut your cakehole and drive faster so we can warn Derek before it’s too late and _Aiden_ kills him” she said, emphasizing on _his_ name and then angrily raised her eyebrows. “Would that be okay, Ethan?”

Ethan exhaled from his nose. He understood her so he just nodded and without saying anything else, he hit the gas pedal harder.

“We know about the lunar eclipse” Ethan said, looking at the little group ahead of him that included Derek, Peter and Cora. They were looking at Stella and Ethan, standing near the door in the loft. At first, they were surprised to see Ethan in here but when they saw Stella walking in with him, they knew something was wrong. Ethan and Stella told Derek what was going to happen and who was coming. He listened to them with his crossed arms in front of his chest, being his stubborn self. Stella knew it wasn’t going to be easy to convince him to run but she had to try. Ethan continued while Stella kept her position next to him, staring at the Hales. “So, don’t think Kali’s going to sit around waiting for it to level the playing field.” Cora kept scowling and sending death glances at Ethan, like she could rip him apart in any second. She hated him ever since the death of Boyd, her friend but she listened to him anyway. “She’s coming. And my brother is coming with her.”

Stella nodded, looking directly at Derek. “I believe him, Derek” she said, not breaking her eye contact. “She’s coming for you. Coming to kill you.”

Peter clapped his hand to each other, already on board with the plan of running away. “Good enough for me” he said, then he turned around to look at Derek, waiting for his answer with his hands pressed to each other. “Derek?” Peter’s blue eyes lingered on his nephew, waiting for him to also be on board with this plan, waited for him to ran outside the door in that moment.

But Derek wasn’t someone who would run and hide. Stella knew that as she looked at him but, somehow, she hoped different.

It all shattered when Derek parted his lips. “You want me to run?” he asked in disbelief, looking at Stella instead of Peter. He raised his eyebrows and watched Stella exhale frustratedly from her nose and look back at him.

“No” Stella said sarcastically, looking at him. She shook her head as she continued with the same sarcasm level, only adding more on that. “I only came here to warn you about a psychotic alpha werewolf, possibly, with a foot fetish who wants to slaughter you. And I came here to do that with someone I can barely stand like I have nothing better else to do, you know, like saving my uncle from being the last sacrifice… don’t know if you remember that one…” She rolled her eyes. “Of course, I want you to run.” She opened her hand to aside, walked few steps towards Derek. “Sprint, gallop, leap your way the hell out of this goddamn town.”

“If you want to fight and die for something, that’s fine with me” Cora said, standing right next to her brother, implying that she is okay with everything Derek wants but as she took few steps beyond him to get in his eye sight and force him to look at her, she spoke again. “But do it for something meaningful.”

“How do you know I’m gonna lose?” Derek questioned, looking at Ethan and Stella but this question was practically for everyone standing in the loft.

“We don’t, but I’ll bet she has an idea” Peter said, looking at Stella. Young Argent took a step back by reflex as Peter continued with his eyes locked in on her. “Don’t you, Stella?”

Stella raised her eyebrows, pointing herself in disbelief. “Me?” she asked. “How in the hell could I possibly know something?”

“You may not know” he said, correcting himself and walking slowly towards Stella who kept scowling at him with her eyebrows knotted with confusion, her heart beating faster. “But you feel something, don’t you?”

Derek looked at the young girl in front of them who was standing next to Ethan. “What do you feel?” he asked curiously.

Stella blinked few times, looked around. She was trying to ignore this feeling since the minute she stepped inside, thinking it was just her anxiety but as her brown eyes found Derek, she was almost too sure that it was now more than that. “I feel like…” She started under her breath. “I feel like I’m standing in a graveyard.”

Stella looked up at Derek and out the corner of her eyes, she saw Cora’s smile slowly fading away. 

“Just grab anything?” Scott repeated over the phone, talking to Stiles as he raised his eyebrows and walked out of the elevator with Allison and Isaac by his side. They walked towards to the Argent’s apartment because they needed to get something from Chris’ stuff for Scott and Isaac to catch a scent from and some weapons for Allison to use if in need. “Stiles, I’m not smelling your dad’s boxers. Socks?” Scott sighed and hit his legs in defeat as Allison opened the door for them. “Okay, I’ll smell the socks.”

Scott hung up the phone and slide it back inside his pocket meanwhile Isaac turned to look at Allison. They were now inside, walking in the hallway alongside of each other. “What about me?” Isaac asked curiously.

“See what you can find in my dad’s closet” Allison told him as she kept walking towards to her dad’s study. “Anything with the strongest scent.” She saw Isaac nod and then walked into the study but abruptly stopped in the doorway, seeing the obvious difference in the room. The desk was covered with their weapons and behind her dad’s chair, someone was standing with two cops next to them.

She realized it was Scott’s dad, Agent McCall from what he told her before.

“Quite an arsenal your father’s got here, young lady” Agent McCall stated, looking down at the weapons on the table. Then he straightened his back and lifted his head up to look at Allison. Hearing his voice and noticing the way Allison froze in front of the door, Scott walked over to the study. He also froze next to Allison the minute he saw his dad who moved on his spot nervously, seeing his son in front of him. “Scott.”

“What are you doing here?” he asked curiously, keeping his confused gaze on his father.

“Following one of the only leads I have” Agent McCall answered and as his eyes moved onto Allison, he continued. “I was hoping your cousin… Stella to be here as well. Any idea where she might be?” Allison knew about Stella’s record, her struggle with the NYPD but right now this had nothing to do with her and Allison was going to keep it that way.

She was going to make sure that Stella wasn’t a part of this as she parted her lips and tried so hard not to roll her eyes. “Can we leave Stella out of this, please?” she asked, trying not to lose her manners. “She has nothing to do with this.”

Agent McCall sighed and then nodded. “I am not here to talk about Stella Argent’s highly messed up criminal record, anyway” he said and then he put his hands back in his pocket. Scott let out an angry breath, seeing his father drag the two girls he deeply cared about into the middle of this mess. “Now, since I don’t know where you’ve been, why don’t you have a seat, and we can talk.” Agent McCall pointed the empty seats and then yelled out. “You too, Isaac!”

As his head peaked from the open door, he confusedly frowned and parted his lips. “How do you know my name?” he asked

“Your name is one of the few things I know” Agent McCall replied the young man. “To be honest, the rest of what’s going on around here has me stumbling in the dark.” He shrugged as his gaze moved between the weapons on the desk and the teenagers sitting on the chairs. “Even over the smallest clue.”

“If you’re trying to tell me that you don’t have a clue…” Scott started as he took a step forward, standing in front of Isaac and Allison now, in the middle of the study room. “I learned that a long time ago.”

Agent McCall sighed. “I’m really hoping to avoid embarrassment of dragging my own son into an interrogation room” he said. “Really hoping.”

The moment Derek’s alarm system started beeping, Kali ripped it apart from the wall with a swing of her feet and crashed the metal, making it stop and threw it away.

Stella sighed in a fake relief as she kept sitting on the table in front of the big windows with Ethan by her side. She kept her eyes on the alpha, trying to not freak out and let her anxiety take control. “Thank God!” she exclaimed, attracting Kali’s attention to herself. As her angry alpha werewolf eyes found the Argent, she continued. Her heart was pounding in her chest, reducing more anxiety by the second. “That was my least favorite item in this loft. Always beeping, always telling something is wrong.” She shook her head. “Something is always wrong, I mean…” She perfectly faked a scoff. “We don’t need an annoying alarm system to tell us about it.” She looked at Ethan. “Don’t you agree with me Ethan?” She looked at Ethan but before he could say something, Kali’s angry voice filled up the empty loft.

Ethan didn’t even get a chance to go along with her act because Kalia growled angrily between her teeth and then her angrier voice followed that sound. “Where is he?” she asked, looking at them both as she was radiating anger from all over her body.

Stella snapped her fingers while Ethan’s eyes were on his brother and Kalia with his arms crossed in front of his chest. He let Stella do all the talking. “You know what?” Stella responded, her eyes on Kalia. “You just missed him.” She knew she was forcing Kalia to her limit which was probably very close since she was too furious for her own health already. But as her eyes drifted to Aiden, seeing him there… She just continued. “I think he said he was heading out to do some shopping, run few errands.” She shrugged. “I don’t know what sour and dumbass werewolves do on a casual afternoon.” She nervously gulped down as her eyes lingered on Aiden more than she intended to. She stopped and silently cleared her throat. She swallowed hard, her hands joining the conversation in the air in front of her. “Not that, uh… Not that this is a causal afternoon.” She scoffed, getting her strength back while Aiden kept watching her from a long distance, thinking how stupid and brave she was to annoy Kali like that. “You know, otherwise I would be at home, studying for my midterms.”

“Who do you think you are talking to?” Kali asked in disbelief and anger as she took a step closer to her. Her jaw was clenched, all of her muscles were tensed as she raised her eyebrows, keeping her scowl at Stella.

Stella bit her lip as her eyes moved between her long black toenails and her face. “Someone in desperate need of pedicure” she responded sarcastically, raising her eyebrows as she crossed her arms in front of her chest. “I’d be happy to give you a referral. And if you don’t trust my advice, then I can always call Lydia.” She faked a smile. “She’s a lot better than me at this type of situations.”

Kali took a step towards Stella in a threatening way, keeping her _furious_ eyes on the young Argent but stopped as she realized something. The minute she moved towards Stella, Aiden walked over to Kali and stood right behind her with the need of protecting not Kali but Stella. The alpha felt it on him, ended up with Kali facing Aiden this time in a threatening way who did everything they’ve asked him to till this moment but when it came to Stella and her security… He would never let anything happen to her. He knew that. Ethan knew that. That was the reason he asked Stella for help. That was why she was here.

In that moment, Kali understood that as well. She raised her eyebrows and and stared at Aiden, parting her lips angrily. “Oh, really?”

“I’m not gonna lie” The agent continued. Allison and Scott were sitting on the chairs and Isaac was sitting on the coffee table between them, listening to Scott’s father. “I’m more than a little disturbed, not only by the number of parents missing…” Isaac pulled out a blue mint box from his pocket. “… but the fact that it’s Stiles’ father…” He pointed at Allison. “… your father…” He turned to his son. “… and your mother.”

He put his hands back in his pocket while took a mint from the box, closed the box and raised his hand amusingly. “Mine are both dead” Isaac commented sarcastically, not feeling any grief over his death parents as he put the mint inside his mouth, keeping his gaze at the agent at all times.

“Save the cliched teenage apathy for your high school teachers” he warned Isaac who kept smiling lightly instead of taking him seriously. Rafael McCall continued, looking at them all. “The three of you know more than you’re saying, and I’m fully willing to keep you here all night if I have to.”

All they could do was share a look as they thought about their kidnapped parents, being waited to be the last sacrifices.

“Did someone take their little assignment too seriously?” Kali teasingly questioned, walking around Aiden as she accused him but also having slightly fun with the situation. Stella’s lips moved apart as her eyes got locked on Aiden, watching him. Her brain went back to the moment in the car with Ethan, hearing everything he told her as she tried to toss them away again.

Stella looked away when Aiden looked at her and then looked back at Kali. “She is not the problem” he confidently and protectively told the alpha. 

“Maybe the problem is where your loyalty lies” Kali growled between her teeth as she stood right in front of Aiden.

“Oh God” Stella murmured, watching Aiden and Kali almost ready to rip their throats with their teeth. She couldn’t look away as she continued, asking Ethan “Is this the part where it gets very violent?”

Ethan couldn’t take his eyes away from his brother and Kali either, waiting on standby as he lightly nodded. “Probably” he responded and that was exactly when things went… literally… violent.

Right after Ethan responded to Stella and agreed with her, it felt like karma or whatever the hell that was heard them. The minute Ethan voiced the last syllable, Jennifer broke the ceiling window and with the broken glasses falling down and Ethan grabbing Stella, dragging away from the shattered window, covered her with his muscled arms, Jennifer jumped down into the middle of the loft.

Stella gasped in shock as she grabbed back Ethan’s arms around her tighter by relax and watched Jennifer flip her hair back. She looked around the room, trying to find that one person she came here for. As her eyes stopped on her… As she stared at Kali, she stretched her legs back to their normal length, straightened up. She kept her eyes on the werewolf who Stella could swear she saw the regret and fear in her eyes of. 

Jennifer looked at them, challenging them. “So, who wants to go first?” she asked.

As an answer, Kali growled and transformed herself to her actual werewolf form with her eyes on Jennifer. And then the fight started. She kept kicking, punching, attacking but Jennifer dodged every attack as she ducked, slid to the side and bent back. Stella’s brown wide-open eyes were locked on the fight, watching another werewolf cage fight in this stupid loft. Because of the shock and fear, she forgot that she was still between Ethan’s arms on the ground for a moment there.

Ethan kept holding her back for her and for himself so that none of them would attack Jennifer and try to get in between of her and Kali because he knew if they were to do that, none of them would come out alive and Ethan couldn’t let that happen. 

As they stayed in their little corner, Jennifer pushed Kali, radiating some white power cloud that knocked her down. Seeing Kali out, Aiden walked over to Jennifer angrily. He knew she was here to kill them and he knew he wasn’t going to let her do that.

When Aiden took his place against Jennifer and started fighting her, he had no luck either. He punched, attacked, did everything he could but Jennifer did the exact same thing she did to Kali. Ethan couldn’t take seeing his brother like that. He let go of Stella in the corner, wolfed out, took his jacket off and threw it aside. Stella watched Aiden do the same thing as well, knowing what they had in their mind. Ethan ran towards to his brother. They grabbed each other’s arms, started merging but Jennifer grabbed them by the throats and separated them. Stella stood up holding onto the column next to her, breathing heavily as she looked at the twins who were thrown away by Jennifer.

Stella covered her mouth but then quickly pulled it together and ran towards the twins but stood next to Aiden, just to make sure he was okay. As her hand touched his naked shoulder, she didn’t notice Jennifer focused back on Kali. She had no idea what was happening as her eyes were on Aiden, watching him cough. He placed his hands on the ground and forced himself to look at her when he was slightly feeling great, recovered from the attack. He looked in her eyes, feeling her skin on his bare shoulder. “Run” he mouthed silently. “Go away, Stella. Run!” Stella pressed her lips into a thin line, shaking her head no. How could she run when they were all in danger? 

She stayed on her knees, next to Aiden. Her hand slipped down onto his biceps. She looked up at Jennifer when her voice echoed in the loft. “That’s right, Kali, look at me” she said with an obvious disgust in her voice, looking at Kali. Stella tried to remember why she hated her so much but then it hit her. She remembered a little story. That’s it, Stella thought. Jennifer used to be Kali’s pack’s emissary and she slashed her, thought she killed her but she wasn’t dead. She felt worse. “Look at my face. Do you know what it takes to be able to look like this?” Her voice, every word came out sharper than before. “To be able to look normal?”

“I don’t care!” Kali responded, shaking her head to both sides as she shouted.

“It takes power” Jennifer continued with a tough and sharp voice, ignoring what Kali said since she was about to get her revenge. “Power like this.” She pulled her hands up and Stella noticed that the broken glasses moved upwards with her. The cold wind filled up the loft, flying over their hairs. Sharp glasses kept moving up in the air but then stopped with the motion of Jennifer’s hands.

The sharp points were directed towards Kali, threatening her. 

“I- I should’ve- I should’ve ripped your head off!” Kali yelled out. Jennifer screamed and with her own force, the broken glass pieces moved towards the alpha. The glasses stabbed her on her body, in her eyes. She fell down and never stood back up. Stella gasped, covered her mouth as she kept looking at Kali’s dead body.

And then she felt Jennifer’s gaze on her.

Stella held her breath, pressed her lips together and forced herself up. She walked back, away from the twins in fear. She felt the weight of her 45 in her back pocket but she knew Jennifer could rip her head off before even she could pull it out. She took another step back, watching Jennifer walking towards her with a powerful grin. Out of the corner of her brown eyes, she noticed Aiden and Ethan, merging into their big giant alpha self but she looked back at Jennifer. She played it cool, giving them the advantage of surprise.

But when they stood behind Jennifer, it almost like she knew they were there. Stella kept walking backwards in fear, watched Jennifer turn to look at the twins with a smile. She watched them walk towards each other.

Twins attacked but Jennifer warded off the attack again. She slid to the side smoothly and held them by the throat behind them. When she pulled to herself, Stella heard a bone breaking sound, making her to gasp in fear and shock. Her shocked brown eyes watched the twins fell down with blood coming out from their lips, defeated by Jennifer.

The sound of their neck breaking echoed in Stella’s ears for solid few seconds as her trembling lips fell apart in shock. Her chest started moving a lot faster with every quick and heavy breath she took in and let out. She couldn’t look away from their bodies, seeing their brown eyes. Her gaze was locked on them, laying on the ground in the loft, not breathing, not showing any sign of being alive. Her whole body tensed up, her hands started shaking as she kept looking at Aiden and Ethan’s eyes, not even splitting in two anymore. She hated it. She hated the emotions, the regrets she saw in their eyes. She hated that Ethan and… Ethan and Aiden weren’t breathing anymore. 

She started breathing faster, trying to ignore the lump in her throat and the weight on her chest. She felt like her whole body was just too heavy for her to carry. She held onto the metal table, getting her strength from it as she’s… She felt like there wasn’t another moment in her life that she’s never been this desperate and alone before.

Chris, Sheriff and Melissa were trapped to be sacrificed, being held captive in a magical tree root that they had no idea where it was. Allison, Scott, Isaac, Lydia and Stiles weren’t there. She didn’t know if they were okay. She didn’t know what they were doing. She didn’t know if… She didn’t know if they were able to find them. She was alone in this loft and the twins… Ethan and Aiden… They were probably dead.

Stella kept her eyes on them as she heard Jennifer. “What’s the line coach likes to say?” she asked amusingly with an evil smile on her face. “The bigger they are…” She chuckled as the thunder crumbled and echoed in the room. Jennifer started looking at Stella who was still looking at the twins, at their open brown eyes.

But they never blinked again.

“You can’t keep us here” Scott argued, getting tired of this goddamn interrogation. He had to save his mother and he was being trapped by his own father in his ex-girlfriend’s house.

“Not without some kind of warrant” Allison added, she was playing with her fingers.

Agent McCall looked at her behind the black leather chair he was putting his hands on. “I’ve got a desk full of probably cause” he said, pointing the guns on the desk with his head. Allison sighed, standing up and walked over to the table. She looked at him as she took a deep breath and blinked few times before opening her lips.

“My father is a highly respected private security consultant and federally licensed firearms dealer” she responded as she put her hands on the table and lifted her head up to look at the agent. “That means he has to own a few weapons.” Allison pointed one of them. “Like this 175-pound draw tactical crossbow.” Rafael rolled his eyes as Allison pointed another one. “Or this carbon steel marine combat knife, .50ae desert eagle.” She shrugged and reached for another weapon. “Smoke grenade with pull ring igniter.” She quickly pulled the ring to herself, firing the grenade up and threw it Agent McCall and then speedily turned to Isaac and Scott. “Go!”

As the boys followed Allison out of the apartment, Agent McCall yelled after them, covering her mouth as he was coughing. “Wait!” he shouted as the room was filled with smoke and he couldn’t see anything at all. “Scott, wait!”

“What the hell do you want from me?” Stella asked as she kept breathing shakily and shallowly, her heart pounding fast inside her chest. She kept walking backwards, trying to hide her fear as she looked back at Jennifer in the eye. She took a deep breath, shakily gave it out. She tried so hard not to look at the twins again, forced her gaze to stay on Jennifer.

“I want you to do what you do best, Stella” Jennifer responded with a smile. She walked over to her, causing Stella to gulp in fear as she kept staring at the young Argent. “I want you to scream.”

Stella tried so hard to get her sarcastic self out to protect herself. “I, uh…” She nervously gulped down. “I don’t usually scream without a reason.” She shrugged, looking at Jennifer who was still smiling evilly. She had to hide her fear, she had to ignore the voices in her mind. “You know… as a banshee, I don’t take requests.” Stella shrugged again as she shook her head. “Sorry. Maybe another time.”

Ms. Blake softly scoffed. “Uh, I’m pretty sure you can make an exception for me, Stella” she said and then she showed Stella her real face. As she looked at her, seeing the ripped off face and remembering it was the same one she saw in the fire back in Glen Capri, she couldn’t take it anymore. She felt defeated against the tension and that unnamed feeling ever since Kali died.

Stella opened her mouth and with taking power from every cell on her body, she screamed as loud as possible.

Derek startled, hearing the scream and quickly pulled over the car drifting it to the sidewalk and then looking at his sister who was looking back at him in confusion. “What the hell was that?” she asked.

“Stella” Derek worriedly responded with a frown. His hand stayed on the hand break, looking down at an empty spot around his hand, thinking but his shock only lasted few seconds. As he lifted his head up for his eyes to meet with his sister, he quickly parted his lips. “We have to go back.”

And then without even waiting for Cora’s answer, he started the engine again and went back on the road to go back to his loft.

Allison parked her car right next to Scott’s bike. He got off on his foot and took out his helmet, placing it on the bike while Allison and Isaac climbed out of the car and quickly walked over to him. “Are you okay?” she asked curiously, talking about his father because they didn’t have a chance to talk after the incident back in the apartment.

“I didn’t know what to say to him” Scott said, walking towards them. “I couldn’t come up with anything, but what you did…” He widely smiled at Allison as he continued. “That was awesome!”

Allison send him back a light smile and brushed her hair back. “Stella’s original idea” she explained, shrugging like it wasn’t a big deal. “Sometimes she’d get away from the arguments like that. She used to say it was the best escape plan she’d ever come up with.” As Scott smiled acridly at Allison, she smiled back at him and took a deep breath.

Isaac walked over to them with his phone between his fingers. “I still haven’t gotten anything from Stiles” he announced, turning to look at Scott. “You?” Scott shook his head, telling him that he got nothing too. As they just stood there, he couldn’t help but worry about them, worry about everything. He was thinking about Stella and Lydia. He knew as soon as she was okay with her mother, she was going to join Stella but hearing nothing from any of them yet just made him more anxious.

“I don’t get it.”

“Alright. Well, we can’t wait for him. Come on!” As Allison followed Isaac, Scott stopped for a while to look at his phone and checked the road they drove to get here. Finally, he went after Allison and Isaac, not knowing Stiles crashed his jeep to a tree due to heavy fog.

When Stella came to, it didn’t take too long for her to realize she was sitting on the ground with Cora by her side. She couldn’t even remember when they came back or why they came back. At first, when she opened back her eyes, she only felt Cora’s smooth hand moving on her back. She didn’t even see her as her eyes were only focused on Aiden and Ethan who were still on the ground without moving and without breathing, still in their giant alpha self. Kali was few inches away from them, laying on the ground with glasses on and inside her body. She kept laying on the ground, not moving, dead while Cora’s hand kept moving up and down on Stella’s shoulder and on her back, trying to calm her down and give her support but all Stella could do was having trouble of breathing, totally spaced out.

Meanwhile Derek was talking to Jennifer. “You did this for me?” he asked in disbelief, standing near the door while facing her.

“For us” Jennifer corrected him, arguing with him heatedly. “For anyone who’s ever been their victim.”

“Stop talking to me like a politician” Derek yelled as he took few steps closer to her with each word. He continued. “Stop trying to convince me of your cause!”

“Fine, I’ll convince you of someone else’s.” Derek frowned as they both kept looking at each other. Cora was looking at them, still kneeled down on the ground next to Stella. She listened to them as she kept trying to calm Stella down. Jennifer continued. “Scott’s” she said. When Stella heard his name, she slowly lifted her head up to look at Jennifer with her red and puffy eyes. She was still grieving, feeling empty and spaced out but she could still hear them through her pounding heart. “You can save his mother, Stiles’ father and Stella’s uncle.”

“How?” Derek asked curiously.

“I need a guardian” Jennifer responded, walking towards Derek. “And that’s a role that can either be filled by the three parents I was forced to take or…” She paused before she finished her sentence. “By you.”

“I can’t help you” Derek said as he shook his head. “I’m not even an alpha anymore.”

“All I need is for you to help me get Deucalion in the right place at the right time” Jennifer said, determined as she kept her gaze on Derek.

“You just killed three of them on your own” Derek reminded, causing Stella to relive her shock as she held tighter the column near her. Honestly, she couldn’t be careless about Kalia but the twins? Ethan and Aiden… She felt like her breath was stuck in her lungs as her eyes moved towards them without her own will. “What do you need me for?”

“You haven’t seen him at his strongest” Jennifer told him. She kept looking into his eyes, trying to show the fear in her own eyes. “I have. And if he’s got Scott with him, I don’t stand a chance unless I have you.”

Cora lifted her head up to look at her brother. “Derek, don’t trust her” she said, feeling the need to speak up with a sharp tone. She needed her brother not to do something stupid like going with her. 

“I have the eclipse in my favor, but the Moon’s only gonna be in the Earth’s umbral shadow for 15 minutes” Jennifer said, ignoring Cora’s comment. “That’s the extent of my window. There’s no decision to struggle with. Help me kill him, and the others live.” She kept looking at Derek in desperation as she begged. “Just help me!”

The storm was getting stronger by the minute. Dark clouds were in the air, surrounding the Moon. Isaac and Allison were trying to find the Nemeton. Scott was gone with Deucalion to stall Jennifer to give the time they needed but they didn’t have.

“Are you sure we’re going to the right direction?” Isaac asked with a loud voice for Allison to her hear through the wild wind.

“I know we’re near it” Allison replied, practically yelling like Isaac. Her hair was flying through the wind, getting it messier. As she brushed it back to see better and get it away from her face, she turned to look at Isaac. “You think you can pick up a scent?”

“I’m trying but I c-” Young man stopped in the middle of the sentence. “I hear something.” Allison stopped looking at Isaac and started looking around but she could see nothing in this fog. The wind was getting stronger by the minute, making it impossible for her to see or hear anything clearly with the dust and the leaves that were lifting up in the air and the sound it made. But Isaac was able to catch something, a weak sound in the empty. “It’s an- It’s an emitter. It’s one of your dad’s.”

Allison lightly leaned her head back to look at Isaac with newborn hope in her eyes. “Are you sure?”

“It has to be!” He turned to look at Allison. “Come on!” They started running with Isaac on the front. He was leading her because of the fact that he was the only one who could hear the sound.

They ran for a while and after few minutes, they found _it_.

Two teenagers stood right in front of the Nemeton and looked around to find the cellar that Jennifer was holding their parents in. First one out of the two to see it was Isaac due to being a werewolf.

“Allison!” he shouted, getting her attention. Young girl looked at the direction Isaac was pointing at and saw the door. As Isaac quickly ran to the door, Allison followed him without losing any time. 

They opened the door. Allison and Isaac started to take the stairs down. The storm Jennifer was creating was causing all the dust and the ground to fall down inside the cellar slowly but effectively by the second.

Seeing his daughter walking down the stairs towards them, Chris leaned his back to the column behind him in relief and smiled. “Thank God!” Allison exclaimed, reaching up to her father. She formed up a relaxed smile as she looked at Chris’ face.

She placed a soft kiss on his forehead while Isaac headed towards the Sheriff and Melissa to save them.

“You found us” Chris said, looking at his daughter with a proud expression. And then all of a sudden, the worry about his niece came back to life in his brain. “Where is Stella? Is she okay?”

Allison quickly nodded as she was still trying to untie Chris’ hands. “Yes, yes, she’s okay” she assured him but as she thought about her answer, she added hopefully under her breath with a voice that no one was able to hear.

“Where’s Stiles?” Sheriff yelled out in worry as Allison finally untied Chris and freed him from the column. “Where’s my son?”

“And Scott?”

Hearing Melissa’s question, Isaac quickly parted his lips. “They’re coming, alright?” He was trying to untie the Sheriff. “They’re on their way to help!” As Melissa nodded, understanding him, there was a repeated rumbling going on which eventually making the ground fell on Allison and the others, making them trapped in under the Nemeton.

“Stella, we have to get going” Cora said softly, still holding Stella. Derek and Jennifer went out to fight with Deucalion. Stella was still on the ground, feeling exhausted because of the day she barely went through. She didn’t know if Allison and Isaac found Nemeton or saved the parents or…

She watched Aiden and Ethan die. She didn’t have the strength to stand up and fight and put her mask back on. She was tired.

But Cora helped Stella to get off the ground. “We can get help” she continued.

“From who?” Stella asked with a shaky voice. She barely stood up thanks to Cora and they started walking towards the door to get the hell out of here.

“I don’t know but we can’t stay here” Cora answered her, helping her to walk. As they started moving to the door, they heard a soft cracking. They stopped on their spot. They turned around to see what was happening and the minute they saw the twins separated from each other, Stella gasped, running to Aiden.

“Oh, my God” Stella whispered as Stella’s hand moved on Aiden’s chest to check up on him. Cora was doing the same thing to Ethan and then suddenly, both girls heard it. Stella sighed in relief and she lifted her head up to look at Cora. “They’re alive.”

With Deaton’s help, they carried the twins to the vet. This time, Lydia was with them. She was talking with her mother when she saw Stella’s message for her, telling them that they were in the vet clinic because the twins were badly hurt. She dropped everything, gave her mother an excuse and she arrived there at the same time Stella and Cora did.

Through the night, Lydia was walking around with a disturbing feeling in her stomach because without her control, she wasn’t able to help out her friends and now… At least she felt like she did something while helping Cora carry Ethan inside.

As they walked in, Deaton turned to look at Stella with Aiden on his back. “Stella, grab the table!” Stella quickly did what he asked her to do. She pushed away everything off the metal desk to the ground and pulled it over to Deaton. “Grab his hand.” As Lydia and Cora were laying Ethan down on the table, Stella helped Deaton with Aiden as she grabbed his cold hand. She had to hold her breath. “Here you go. Take his hand.”

Aiden and Ethan were now laying on the metal tables next to the each other. Stella gasped in fear when she saw blood coming out of Aiden’s mouth as not being the only one who saw that, Cora looked at the doctor. “Can you save them?” she asked curiously and a little bit of anxiousness.

Deaton softly nodded. “Only if they start healing on their own.”

“It’s blocked” Chris said with his heavy breathing after observing the only exit out of this place. He turned to look at Isaac. “What do you see? Anything?” But Isaac didn’t need to answer to that. After few minutes everything was crumbling down.

The only thing that was saving them from being crushed to death was Isaac who was holding the ceiling with his werewolf strength. “Okay, is it me or is this place getting smaller?” he asked in fear.

Allison quickly turned to look at Isaac who she knew had troubles with small places, which only meant one thing. They needed to get out of here as fast as possible because she’s seen Isaac in smaller places and him wolfing out was the last thing that they needed nor they wanted.

Stella stayed near Aiden, cleaning the blood near Aiden’s lips with a high level of anxiety while Deaton brought two tubes that were probably filled with oxygen inside it. He put the mouth things on the twins as fast as he could and then he brought up a needle. Seeing how big that was, Cora’s eyes opened widely as Deaton turned to Aiden and jabbed the needle into his arm.

As the lunar eclipse started, Isaac started to lose his werewolf mojo, ended up with the Sheriff and Chris helping him hold up the ceiling but they didn’t know long they could hold it. “I can’t do it!” Isaac screamed. “I can’t hold it. It’s too much.” Allison quickly put her arms up and started helping them as they all tried to hold the ceiling up.

“It’s too heavy!” Allison screamed with her arms hurting.

That’s when Stiles came to help. His head was bleeding, he had a bat with him that was not made of wooden this time. It was aluminum. He jumped right next to them and put the bat between the ground the ceiling, making it stay still.

“I always said aluminum is better than wood” the sheriff said as he saw his son and what he did with the bat. Stiles quickly hugged his dad in relief and felt his arms around his body and smiled softly but the shaking of the ground was still continuing.

When Jennifer’s 15 minutes was up, she had nothing to do but made a mountain ash circle around her. During these 15 minutes, thanks to Derek, she healed Deucalion’s eyes so that he could see what he did to her. That way, he was going to be able to see the price it costed for her. But healing him drained all of her power and now she was exhausted. And when she asked Derek to kill him for her, he refused which made Jennifer really angry, but he stood behind it as Jennifer started to hit him back to back.

But when Jennifer’s time was up, the fight was on Scott and others’ favor once again.

Jennifer turned to look at them. “Like I told you Derek, it’s either you or the parents” she said with a voice that was sharp like a knife. “Well, I’ll guess I have to take them now.” She looked at Scott. “In a few minutes, they’ll be dead, and I won’t need a lunar eclipse, even to kill a demon wolf.” Scott’s brain was working on full speed. He could never let that happen. He took a step forward and put his hands one by one on the mountain ash barrier. There was a blue light on the spot where the ashes were. “You’ve tried this before, Scott.” Jennifer formed up a sarcastic smile in victory. “I don’t remember you having much success.”

Scott started pushing with everything he got. He imagined the power and the strength he had in him, piling up. He held onto the need and want to save his mother. He thought about the beautiful times he had with Allison. His memories with Stiles went through his mind. He thought about the brother-sister relationship he had with Stella. He thought about all the things that gave him strength. He remembered a saying of Talia Hale that Derek told him.

_‘I am a predator, but I don’t have to be a killer.’_

Scott didn’t want to be a killer. He wanted to save people and save lives and his family and his friends with this strength he had in him.

Young man lifted his head to look at Jennifer who was looking at him with fear in her eyes. His amber eyes’ color slowly changed, started burning and glowing with the color red. This power and strength in Scott made him an alpha. A true alpha. 

Scott stepped inside the mountain ash circle. As Jennifer took a step back in fear, Scott took another step forward and as he stood inside the circle, it exploded, making the ashes fly around. Jennifer was now unprotected.

With the explosion, she found herself on the ground.

Scott blinked, making the red eyes go away and went back to brown doe eyes. Jennifer’s lips fell apart as she was scared and slid back, away from Scott. She was breathing shakily. “How did you do that?” she managed to ask as she was looking at Scott.

“I’m an alpha now” Scott answered, looking down at the woman. “Whatever you’re doing to cause this storm, make it stop, or I’ll kill you myself.” Deucalion stood up with his new perfect vision and started walking towards the young woman he genuinely despised due to obvious reasons. “I don’t care what it does to the color of my eyes.”

“It won’t change the color of mine, so allow me” Deucalion said and without anyone being able to stop him, he quickly walked over to Jennifer and sliced her throat out with his long claws and angry face.

As Jennifer started drowning in her blood, gasping for ear, the storm stopped.

The group who was happy the most about the storm being over was the ones who were still stuck in the cellar. Allison looked around. There was no wind, no little earthquakes. “Is it over?” she asked in hope and relief.

As Stiles hugged his dad again, there were relaxed laughter in the background.

After a while, the twins started to heal thanks to Deaton and when they were a lot better, Stella and Lydia took a deep breath and then gave it out in relief. The girls looked at each other across the room where Cora and Lydia were taking care of Ethan, helping him stand. Cora placed his arms around her shoulder to get the support and the strength he needed to get up.

Meanwhile, Stella stayed with Aiden.

Aiden was still laying on the metal desk in front of Stella who was cleaning up the blood on his naked chest with towel. She was so relieved by the fact that Aiden was okay and still breathing and most importantly, alive.

Stella pulled herself away from her running thoughts and looked at Aiden as she felt his soft but still cold fingers on her hand that she placed on his shoulder. As she looked down, she saw him looking back at her with a little grin on his handsome face. For someone who was dead and back, he was still cocky as hell which was actually another relief for Stella to see he was himself.

“I knew” Aiden said as he kept grinning.

A confused yet sarcastic smile appeared on Stella’s face as she looked down at Aiden. “What?” She raised her eyebrows, kept looking at Aiden. “You knew how stupid and unnecessary it was of you to go and attack Jennifer like that?” she asked. She softly scoffed and then continued. “It wasn’t that big of a secret now, was it?”

Aiden kept smiling lightly as he was looking at the young Argent. “I knew you liked me” he said, causing another spaced-out look on Stella’s face. An expression that she couldn’t help but form… Like… Love… She slowly shook her head to both sides, using the last bit of sarcasm she has left and then looked at Aiden. It wasn’t a good time for her to talk about this subject now.

And Aiden? Well, he could sense the struggle Stella was going through inside but he just couldn’t help the smile on his face.

“Tone it down, cowboy” she said with a light and sarcastic smile. “If I were you, I wouldn’t go that far just yet.” Then she did something even Aiden wasn’t expecting her to. She leaned in and placed a soft kiss on his lips. Aiden kissed her back gladly. Their tongues touched and she stayed there like that for a while with her eyes closed but then she ended the kiss before they went too far.

Aiden opened his eyes and looked at Stella. “Uh, not that I am complaining” he started. He was smiling but he was also in shock of this sudden move that came from Stella. “And believe me, I am definitely not complaining. Like, at all.” Stella softly chuckled, keeping her gaze on him. “But what was it for?”

Stella softly smiled. “I wanted to thank you” she started explaining. “For saving my ass.” Aiden’s smile got deeper. He turned his head to place a soft kiss on Stella’s wrist of the hand that she put near his shoulder.

Stella sighed. She put the towel back on the bucket and she thought to herself. _And thank you for being alive._

Stiles immediately answered the call from his best friend, moving the phone up to his ear as they were still trapped under the cellar. “Scott?” he said.

“Hey, are you okay?” he asked curiously, worried about his friends, their families and his mother.

“Yeah, we’re okay.” He smiled softly, looked at the people around him. Everyone was smiling, relieved that this was all over. “We’re all okay.” Stiles stopped, frowned and continued. “How about you? You okay?”

Scott turned over to look at Derek. He was shaking his head, telling him to don’t ask and looked back at the floor as he was taking deep breathes. He was tired from today, exhausted. Scott turned back to Stiles who was still on the phone. “Sort of” he decided to say.

“You think you can come get us?” Stiles asked.

“Yeah, of course” Scott nodded, making Stiles to take a relieved breath.

“Great, okay.” Stiles was nodding his head. Then he started talking again, thinking about something else that popped in his mind. “Um, uh, bring a ladder” he said, making everyone laugh and chuckle.

Few days later, when everything was quiet, Allison and Stella walked into Chris’ study room as he was taking care of the guns. The girls spent their days telling each other stories, what has happened and how were they and more. They were both still extremely tired but there was one thing left for them to do.

And it was very important.

“Back to Storage?” Stella curiously questioned, raising her eyebrows slightly on her forehead as she laid against the wall next to the door with Allison by her side.

Chris responded them without even looking at them since he was still focused on the weapons on his desk. “That’s the plan” he said, making Stella to roll her eyes and cross her arms in front of her chest.

“What if we’ve got a different plan?” Allison asked, looking at her father curiously, waiting for his reaction which was him looking at them with a frown.

That’s when Stella took a step forward and started talking. “Deaton said that what we did in order to find you…” She sighed. “He said that it might draw things here, things like can make Beacon Hills kind of a beacon again.” It was one of the things Allison and she talked about for the last few days. The both thought and they both knew that they had to be prepared.

“I hope not” Chris reacted as he looked away from them. He closed the big box that was standing in front of the window and turned around to look at his daughter and niece who seemed very determined and confident about this.

“We were thinking that maybe we should be prepared” Allison continued, emphasizing Stella’s words, making their argument a lot stronger. “Learn to be a better fighter and learn all the things that you can still teach us.”

“And maybe a few things more” Chris agreed with his daughter, smiling lightly as his eyes were on the girls.

“But, before that, we’re gonna have a new rule” Stella said, straightened up as she looked at her uncle’s eyes as confident as she could be. Chris, hearing that, started smiling softly and straightened his back and frowned curiously, waiting for her to continue. “Nous protégeons ceux qui ne ne peuent pas se protéger eux-mémes.”

Chris started to smile, the proud on his face was so obvious. “We protect those who cannot protect themselves” he translated and then as he looked up at the girls, he nodded. “That’s why the women in our family are always the leaders.”

“I honestly don’t know if he’s ever coming back, and part of me hopes so…” Scott stopped as he thought about Derek who went to South America with his sister Cora after the whole battle with Deucalion and Ms. Blake. “… But another part hopes that maybe he’ll be okay somewhere else.” As he continued, he started thinking about what happened the other day. His dad stopped by the house, knocked on his door. Scott opened the door but as soon as he saw it was him, he closed it on his face without giving him a chance to talk. “My dad doesn’t look like he’s gonna be leaving for a while. Doesn’t mean he’s welcome.” _Young man opened the door and walked into the school._ “Stiles and I both feel it every day, just like you said we would, and it makes me think about that quote Jennifer used to start our first class.” _He looked around._ “Because, when I feel it, yeah, it’s like… I’m looking ‘into the heart of an immense darkness.’”

“So, what do you do instead?” Deaton asked curiously as his gaze lingered on Scott.

The new Alpha softly smiled. “I look for my friends” he replied.

_As the young man looked around in the halls, the first friend he noticed was Stella, talking with Aiden as they were near Stella’s locker. Aiden’s shoulder was rested against Allison’s locker while Stella rested her back against her own._

_Scott focused on the super hearing._

_“I am having trouble catching up with what’s going on here” Stella joked as she smiled and crossed her arms in front of her chest. She looked at Aiden. “No more Deucalion?” While Stella waited for an answer, Scott found himself softly smiling._

_Aiden laughed as he tucked the loose strand of her hair behind her ear. “No more Deucalion or an alpha pack” Aiden answered with the same attitude as he kept looking at Stella. “As a matter of fact, I am not even an alpha anymore.”_

_Stella pressed her lips together so that she wouldn’t smile but she couldn’t help her lips curling up. “Yeah, I wish I could say I was sorry about that.” She shrugged. “I really am not.” Aiden chuckled lightly, pushing his body off the locker as he placed his hand above Stella’s head._

_“Are you free tonight?” he asked, making Stella to twist her lips and actually think about it, knowing she had nothing better to do tonight._

_She looked at Aiden, started grinning. “What do you have in mind?” she asked, surprising Aiden with her answer as he knew after what he was forced to do with Kali… Stella barely looked at his face. But for Stella, it was hard for her to see him not moving and partly dead that night. She cared about him and she was not going to hide that. She knew she couldn’t do it even if she wanted to. Not after everything…_

_Aiden leaned in and put a soft kiss on her check. Scott saw Stella avoiding looking at Aiden as she smiled and when her eyes stopped on Scott, knowing he was listening on them, she smiled more, nodding to tell him everything was okay._

_Scott’s eyes slid to Danny and Ethan who were holding hands as they got out of the class. They were both smiling as they were talking. They looked happy._

_As he heard their laughter, Scott turned to look at Allison and Isaac who were walking down the stairs together. It still hurt seeing them together but what mattered the most was to see Allison happy and seeing that big smile on her beautiful face was worth everything._

_He looked at Lydia who was looking proudly at Stella and Aiden from far away, near her locker. As she was putting a lipstick on, her eyes moved to Scott. In that moment, Scott felt someone’s hand on his shoulder and a slow pat on the back._

_He instantly knew it was Stiles._

_Two friends smiled at each other and starting walking to their first class of the day._

“But what about Ms. Blake?” Deaton asked curiously looking at Scott.

“I don’t know” Scott answered his boss. “When we went back to distillery, her body was gone.” As a respond, all Deaton was to look at Scott with his eyebrows knotted in surprise.

_Jennifer gasped, dragging her sliced body on the ground to the Nemeton. “Oh, please, please.” Her hand reached for the Nemeton’s stump. “You saved me once.” Right when her fingers touched the center of the tree where all the power was laying, someone grabbed her hand from behind and turned her body strongly to themselves. Young woman laughed in pain as she realized who it was. Peter Hale… “Of course, it’s you” she painfully said. “Everyone else suffers, but somehow, you come out on top.” Peter was smiling, looking down at the woman. “And now that Scott’s an alpha, you’ll be able to steal it from him. You’ll be an alpha again.”_

_“Again?” Peter asked, shocked and annoyed. He was getting angry. He grunted. “Again?” He lifted his claws up in the air. As Jennifer gasped in fear, with one single motion, just like Deucalion, Peter ripped off her throat, officially killed her and then continued with anger. “I… Am… The alpha!” He looked up in the sky and screamed. “I’ve always been the alpha!”_


	13. ANCHORS

Stiles’ hands grabbed the white sheet underneath him without his control. His eyes were closed shut, taking deep breathes out of fear because of the dream…No, the nightmare that he was currently hunted with. He squeezed every muscle on his body, his eyes were moving behind his eyelids. His head was turning side to side, wanting to wake up from this nightmare that was trapped in but couldn’t. He knotted, creating an anxious v between his eyebrows. His forehead was wet from all the sweat. “No, no, no” he started mumbling. His voice was low, full of fear and pain. “Don’t let them in.” His eyelids closed more like it was even possible, making it wrinkle. He kept mumbling; his heart was beating fast inside his cheat alongside of his heavy breathes. “Don’t let them in. No, don’t let them in.”

And then… he opened his eyes but startled as he realized he was no longer at his house, in his room, on his bed. He was in one of the lockers in the locker room at school, trapped inside. It was dark and the only light source was something in the outside, shinning on him through the open parts of the locker. 

His hands met the metal surface of the locker and he started hitting it, trying to get himself out of there. He needed to get out. He had to get out of there as quick as possible. The panic and the anxiety were rapidly rising inside of him. His breathes were irregular, shaky. 

Stiles kept punching and hitting the door but it didn’t work until it did and the locker suddenly opened up for Stiles walk out. His breathes were out of control as he started walking in the hallway. He wasn’t talking, he was looking around, trying to make it make sense. All of the classes’ doors were closed except for one of them that was slightly ajar. Stiles stopped walking, made his way to that class with cautious and frightened steps. He kept taking breathes and giving it out deeply and sharply.

Stiles walked inside the room, but stopped again in front of the door as he saw the Nemeton in the middle of the classroom, breaking every desk, chair and any kind of furniture near it to make a room for itself.

The sky was dark. The moonlight was coming through the windows as Stiles started walking slowly towards the Nemeton. He noticed few things as he looked around, scared of what’s happening. The windows were broken but basically, the only thing that looked in one piece was the Nemeton.

Nothing else...

He slowly reached for the Nemeton. But he quickly realized that it wasn’t that good of an idea because as soon his hand came near the big supernatural tree, the roots went wild and grabbed Stiles’ hand, squeezing it tight.

That’s when he woke up, gasping and panting. His eyes were wide open, and he felt so awake, but something was still bothering him inside. “You okay?” a voice asked, worried about the young man but when he heard her voice, he was still not completely himself. That was why he wasn’t surprised when Lydia sat down, put her hand on his shoulder to calm him down, squeezing and moving up and down. “Stiles?”

Stiles took a deep breath, placed his hand on his lap. “Yeah, I was just dreaming” he assured Lydia just to get her to relax. He wrinkled up his nose as he gently squeezed his nose’s bridge. He slowly gave out his breath as he continued talking. “It was weird. It was like a dream within a dream.”

Lydia softly nodded, turning her head to look at Stiles with worry in her eyes. “A nightmare?” she asked with a whisper. Stiles held Lydia’s hand which was on his shoulder and squeezed it to tell her everything was okay as he lightly smiled at her.

Stiles sighed as Lydia’s hand was moving around on his back which made Stiles stop with a thought. He frowned, first looking at Lydia’s hand and then back to her face. Something was off, something was not right, like Lydia being in the same bed with him.

“Wait a second, Lydia” he softly said, looking at Lydia’s face that still had a soft smile on. “What are you doing here?” Lydia’s lips fell apart to answer his question, but she was interrupted by the door when it suddenly creaked open. They turned their heads towards the sound. Stiles’ gaze lingered on the door with fear in his eyes. “Hang on” Stiles murmured as he let go off Lydia’s hand and got out of the bed.

“Stiles, where are you going?” Lydia asked, holding Stiles’ arm, trying to keep him from going away. Stiles looked like he was in trance, he was looking directly at the door with an empty but frightened look. He was sweating, his forehead was wet again.

“I’m just gonna close the door” he said.

“Just go back to sleep” Lydia continued, scared. She tried to sit Stiles back down onto the bed, but she failed as he was still looking directly at the door.

He held up his finger, asking for one second. “No, no” Stiles mumbled. “I should close it.”

Lydia’s hand fell on the mattress. “Don’t worry about it” she said as she was frightened.

Stiles shook his head, slowly taking a step forward. “What if someone comes in?” he asked, his face was covered in sweat, his hair was wet, and he was still looking at the door with faced eyes and fear in his face.

“Like who?” Lydia asked, curiously and fearfully. Stiles started walking towards the door. “Just go back to sleep, Stiles.” Stiles shook his head again and asked the same question. _What if they get in?_ He was a lot closer to the door now. “What if who gets in?” Lydia continued yelling after him. She started squeezing the blanket without even noticing what she was doing. “Stiles, just leave it.” Stiles stood right in front of the door but all he was doing was to look at the door and the darkness behind it. “Stiles. Stiles, come back to bed. Stiles, please!” Stiles grabbed the door handle. As he pulled it to himself, Stiles started to scream a little with panic and fear. “Don’t, Stiles! Please, don’t!” There were tears in her eyes. “Don’t go in there, please, don’t! Please, Stiles! Don’t!”

But it was too late.

He was standing in front of the Nemeton once again. There was a tough, a wild wind, and Stiles was standing in the middle of the lacrosse field with just his black strapped sweatpants and his red t-shirt.

And then the lights opened. Stiles looked around, his heart pounding. He took a deep breath. “It’s a dream. This is just a dream. It’s just a dream, get it out of your head Stiles. You’re dreaming, alright?” He exhaled. “So, wake up, Stiles! Wake up, Stiles! Wake up!”

Stiles slowly opened his eyes, birds chipping in the background. He narrowed his hazel eyes as he looked at the sun coming through the curtains as his door slowly opened and his dad appeared in his uniform. He was holding a blue cup between his hands. “Hey, time to get up, kiddo” he announced with a soft expression on his face. “Get your butt to school.” Stiles straightened up as he nodded, confirming his dad. Sheriff left his son alone for him to get ready.

Stiles took a breath with the memory of the dream… nightmare, and get out of his bed.

“And you couldn’t wake up?” Scott asked in shock after listening to Stiles’ horrific nightmare. He was feeling a little freaked out as he was trying to understand what happened to his best friend the other night.

“Nope, and it was beyond terrifying” Stiles answered as they took the stairs down, started walking in the campus, making their way to their class. Stiles continued with a question. “You ever heard of a sleep paralysis?”

Scott frowned, holding the strings of his back on his shoulder as he turned his head to his left and looked at Stiles. “Uh, no, do I want to?” Scott answered.

“Have you ever had a dream where you feel like you’re about to wake up, but you can’t move or talk?” Stiles asked as a start-up to explain the term, like always, using his hands as he was talking.

“Yeah. Yeah, I’ve had them” Scott confirmed after a while of thinking. He had some recollections of those kinds of dreams… nightmares.

“It happens because during REM sleep, your body is basically paralyzed” Stiles explained as they were still walking in the campus. “It’s called Muscle Atonia. That way if you start dreaming about running, you don’t actually start running in your bed.”

“That makes sense” Scott reacted as he lightly nodded.

“But sometimes your mind can wake up before your body does” Stiles continued, they reached for another sets of stairs in the campus, slowly going up this time. “So, for this split second, you’re actually aware that your body is paralyzed.”

“And that’s the terrifying part” Scott completed Stiles’ sentence, understanding what the punch line in this scenario was, as he turned his head to look at his best friend.

“It turns your dream into a nightmare” Stiles confirmed the young Alpha. “You can feel like you’re falling, like you’re being strangled, or, in my case, like you’re at the center of a grove of magical trees where human sacrifices took place.”

At the same time, they pushed the door open and walked into the hallway. “You think it means something?” Scott asked curiously.

“What if what we did that night… What if it’s still affecting us?” Stiles rubbed his hands towards each other and then putting them down to his sides with anxiety rising inside him.

Scott frowned, looking at Stiles. “Post-traumatic stress?” he asked.

“Or something” Stiles confirmed him. They walked into their class and sat on their usual spots, back to back. “But you want to know what scares me the most?” Scott quickly turned his back to look at his friend. “I’m not even sure this is real.”

Stiles woke up screaming in fear, anxiety and panic as he sat up on his bed.

His door quickly opened, letting sheriff Stilinski run into take Stiles, his son, into arms after hearing his heartbreaking frightened screams. He quickly sat down behind him and as he held him closer to his body, he sighed.

Stiles kept screaming in his dad’s arms. He was moving in his bed, trying to get himself out of this state of fear. “Hey, hey, hey” The sheriff murmured with a calm and soft voice, still holding his son who had tears streaming down on his face as he kept screaming. His hands moved on his son’s arms, trying to calm him down. “It’s okay. It’s okay. You’re okay.”

Scott took the necessary books from his shelf, put them in his bag, and then he put on his green shirt and took the bag he’s thrown onto the bag, hang it on his shoulder. He sighed, turning around to walk out that door. The sun coming from behind was creating his shadow to hit the white door. Everything was normal.

Everything except for one thing…

The claws on his shadow drew his attention, making him gasp in confusion. His face turned down to look at his hands, only to see his normal fingernails. Young man frowned, not understanding what the hell was going on. His hands curled into a fist, but his shadow was still in his werewolf form, showing the long claws.

Scott slowly opened them back and noticed that his shadow was back to normal. He exhaled, dropped his shoulder and then reached for the door handle. He pulled the door the himself, opened it and came face to face with none other than Isaac.

“Hey” Isaac said, he was pretty nervous against Scott after the recent events that occurred with Allison and him. He looked calm but Scott could feel the heartbeats as Isaac frowned curiously, looking at Scott. “Um, are you going to school?”

“Yeah” Scott confirmed. Isaac may have been nervous about the whole ‘emotional tether’ thing but Scott was also still hurt about it. Maybe it was the whole reason why Isaac was nervous in the first place.

“Okay, me too” Isaac said, nodding lightly.

“Good.” Scott nodded back.

“Can I… Can I… Can I ask you a question?” the werewolf nervously asked.

“Okay” Scott confirmed.

“Are you angry at me?”

“No” the alpha responded.

“Are you sure?” Isaac questioned.

“No” Scott responded, confusing Isaac.

He narrowed his eyes in confusion, kept looking at the alpha in front of him. “What’s that mean?”

“I guess… I’m not really sure how I’m feeling” Scott responded, taking a deep breath in. As he spoke, his gaze moved from his feet up to Isaac who was moving on his spot nervously, shifting his weight from one leg to another.

“Okay” he murmured, his eyes on the alpha. “Do you hate me?”

“No” Scott said. This ‘no’ was a lot certain than the other ones. Of course, he didn’t hate Isaac. He was just… Okay, well, he didn’t know what to feel but he was pretty sure that this wasn’t hate at all. “Of course not.”

“Do you want to hit me?”

“No.”

“I think you should hit me.”

“I don’t want to hit you” Scott said, shrugging with a light smile on his face as he was looking at his friend.

“Are you sure?” Isaac questioned.

“Why would I want to hit you?” Scott replied with a question. “You didn’t do anything, did you?”

“No” Isaac responded. “I mean, um…” he stammered as he paused. “What do you mean?”

“I mean like you didn’t kiss or anything, right?” Scott asked, still smiling but it was slowly becoming less friendly due to the way his mind started imagining things of Allison and Isaac.

“No!” He instantly said, shaking his head. He didn’t do anything with Allison, not even a simple kiss so it was an easy question to answer. “Absolutely not. No.”

“Did you want to?”

Scott totally caught him off guard. “Oh yeah, totally” Isaac answered the young alpha. Scott smiled, biting his lip as he kept looking at Isaac.

Few seconds later, Isaac found himself hitting the wall and then fell on the ground hardly.

Yep, he had it coming.

With the sound of a painting falling down to the floor, Melissa yelled at them near the stairs as her eyes were moving between Isaac and Scott. “Hey!” Isaac clenched his teeth in pain as Melissa’s voice reached to them. “You two supernatural teenage boys. Don’t test my entirely un-supernatural level of patience.” Isaac looked at them by the time Melissa was pointing the painting with her two fingers with the message of put it back up.

As she left them alone, Isaac turned his head to look at Scott. “Feel better?”

“What do you mean?” Stella asked, finally reaching the sunlight as he drove his uncle’s car out of the garage. She frowned in confusion, hearing about Stiles’ nightmare. “You’ve had a sleep paralysis?” She breathed out as she turned the wheel to the right while she was trying to focus on the road and also on Stiles but she was also thinking If she should’ve woken Allison up before she left for school few minutes ago.

Ever since their battle with the Darach and Deucalion, they’ve been sharing the same room for several reasons but mostly because both of them were too anxious to sleep alone in their respected bedrooms. But then, after Stella started having troubles of sleeping, she wanted Allison to sleep in peace and moved back to her room.

Stella gaze moved to the phone’s clock as she heard Stiles continuing over the speaker phone that she placed over the radio. She softly sighed, seeing that it was almost 7:30. She only had, like 2 or 3 hours of sleep when she woke up half an hour ago. She thought about waking up her cousin at first, but Allison wasn’t getting any better than her for the last few days, even last few weeks. That was why she let her sleep for a little longer. The only downside to that was that since her car broke down few days ago, she didn’t have a car. But when Chris told her to take his, she continued with her decision not to wake her up and went down to the garage.

Stella knew that Allison started having some kind of hallucinations in the past few days. She could also guess that it was a side effect of the plan they came up with few weeks ago when they were trying to find the Nemeton to rescue their families. Stella knew how terrible the hallucinations could make someone feel, what a pain in the ass they could be, and she couldn’t help but feel worried about her cousin since she was also taking her hit from those.

Hers weren’t exactly getting better either.

“Yeah, sleep paralysis” Stiles repeated himself underneath his breath. He sighed as he kept getting his bag ready for school. He called and told Stella what the hell happened last night because to be honest, she was the first person he thought of because Stella was the next person after his dad who could remain calm in situations like that. But Stiles would never talk to his dad about this. Never in a million years. Not after what happened last night. Stiles knew he was already worried about him and knowing that, he didn’t want to add another item to his list. He didn’t want to make it worse for him. “I don’t know how many dreams I saw in a dream and it totally turned my dreams into a big bad dream.” He sighed again. “A total freaking nightmare.” He took a breath and continued as he breathed out. “And this was my worst possible nightmare ever. I know because I’ve seen a lot of them.”

Stella exhaled between her lips. She stopped the car as the green light turned to red. She placed her elbow on the open window, rested back and brushed her hair back as she looked at her phone and called ID _Stilinski_ showing on the phone. “Yeah, I know” she murmured. Stiles kept putting his books into his bag and taking deep breathes, walking in his room, listening to his friend. “I’ve had my fair-share with those as well.” Stiles found himself nodding but didn’t say anything as Stella continued, not that he knew what to say anyway. He heard her taking a deep breath and then her voice. “Then, we are on the same page, right?” she asked as she started the engine, watching the red turn into green. “This is all happening because of what we did that night?” She exhaled softly. “Because Allison’s not getting any better either.”

“Yeah, probably” he responded, standing in the middle of his room, looking around to see if he missed anything else but then paused and turned around. “Hey, you are on your way, right?”

“Yeah, I left a little early today, because I can’t sleep but it’s been like that for the last couple of days” she said, confirming him. “I can’t sleep much. Like, at all.” She sighed and shook her head, continued. “Anyway, Stilinski, let’s talk about this with the others.” Stiles murmured, confirming her. “Okay. See you in school.” As they hung up, Stella took a deep breath and right when she ended the call, her phone buzzed again with a new text message. She looked at her phone out the corner of her eyes and seeing the text ID, she sighed.

It was from Aiden.

Stella didn’t know if she was ready to see Aiden yet. Hell, she didn’t even know if he was coming back to school at all. She didn’t know about Ethan as well. Aiden didn’t tell her anything about it nor Stella didn’t ask. She would still see Boyd whenever she looked at him. But seeing Aiden with lifeless brown eyes and blood coming out of his mouth, laying on the ground… That image trumped Boyd, making Stella feel the guilt and remorse. That was why she never felt ready to see him, not after that night even though they did spend some time together in the break… Every time they were together, there was something wrong and something right at the same time. She didn’t know when it all came to this but she was too scared to even ask questions about it.

Stella sighed and leaned forward to lock her phone without looking or reading the message. She lifted her head up, trying to focus on the road but as soon as she saw _something_ on the road, only few feet away from her, she cursed out loud and quickly hit the break.

She frowned as she looked at the _wolf_ on the road that came out of nowhere.

She drew her eyebrows together more as she kept confused gaze on the animal in front of her, not looking away. She focused on it, looked at it really carefully. The wolf had a dark colored fur with blue and red combined colored sharp eyes. It was pretty beautiful actually but Stella was too shocked to think about it since it was an unusual situation.

Because she knew that she was far away from the woods and most importantly, she knew California didn’t have actual wolves for the last 60 years.

But there was something else bothering her, and she didn’t know what that was supposed to be as her lips parted apart in shock. She kept looking at the beautiful creature in front of her, in front of her car. As beautiful as it was, the way it was looking back at her creeped the hell out of Stella.

The most shocking thing came later.

When she heard the honking from behind, Stella flinched and blinked and when she looked back at the road, and realized something. The wolf was gone. Stella blinked few more times, looked around but saw nothing. The car behind her honked at her again to aggressively tell her to move.

Stella put out her arm out of the window, showed the driver the finger as she started the engine. She looked around and got back on the road. The car behind her honked at her again, cursing her back but Stella couldn’t be careless.

As she drove to school, she was still breathing heavily. 

After his call with Stella, Stiles went back to preparing his bag to get ready for school. But besides his sleep paralysis, he had another problem as his mind kept thinking on full speed. He grabbed the book about the World War II, he looked at the title but somehow the letters were mixed up and he couldn’t read anything. Stiles frowned, looking at the book in his hands. Letters weren’t in their places; they were like spaghetti on the book cover, like he had dyslexia.

And then he heard his dad’s voice, coming from the hallway in front of his room. “Hey, you alright?” Sheriff asked, causing Stiles turn his head to look at his father. Sheriff Stilinski’s voice and his expression were only some of the evidence that showed how worried he was of his son. Stiles’ helpless scream last night was still ringing in his ear, torturing him. “You ready for school?”

Stiles looked back at the book before he answered his dad. He noticed that the letters were back in their places now and he was able to read again. He shoved the book in his bag and looked at his father. “Yeah, yeah” he responded, trying to calm his dad. “I’m good.” Sheriff kept looking at his son, not sure if he could believe him. “Dad, seriously, I’m fine” Stiles repeated himself, dropping his shoulders as he kept his gaze on his father. “It was just a nightmare.” He nervously stood but then he pointed the box in his dad’s hands. “What’s that?”

Sheriff looked down at the box as a reaction to his son pointing at it. “That’s just, uh, files from the office” he responded.

“It says…” Stiles said, pointed the box and read what was written on it. “… _Sheriff station, do not remove_.”

“Well, yeah, unless you’re the Sheriff” he responded to his son with a soft and light smile on his face. Stiles nodded, understanding him. Sheriff took a step forward but then as he remembered something, walked back to its spot. “Hey, um, by the way, who were you talking to?” He only heard some of the conversation, and he was curious and worried. Usually, he wouldn’t ask who he was talking to but after last night’s nightmare and learning the truth about the world, he couldn’t help but question.

“Stella” Stiles replied as he hung his bag on his shoulder.

Sheriff frowned. “Is there a problem?” he couldn’t help but ask. “I’ve never heard you talk to her this early.”

Stiles shook his head. “No, no, everything is fine” he said. “She just wanted to know when I’ll be in school.”

Sheriff Stilinski nodded and then as he added a light smile on his face, he opened his mouth again. “Now get your butt to school, alright?” As Stiles nodded, he left him alone.

“Gotta run, dad. I’m late!” Allison yelled as she quickly grabbed her jacket and her bag and made her way to the elevator. She didn’t hear what her dad said because by the time he responded to her, she was already in the elevator, going down to the garage.

She crossed her arms in front of her chest, waiting in the elevator for it to arrive at her floor. She was running late because Stella didn’t wake her up this morning, but she could guess the reason so as she sighed, she didn’t really blame her.

When the temperature dropped all of a sudden, Allison frowned, hugging herself to keep herself warm. She was aware that she was going down to the garage, but it wasn’t normal for it to be this cold. Even for Allison who was dealing with supernatural stuff all the time... It only meant one thing according to the bestiary, but it wasn’t unlikely as well.

As the vapor came out from her mouth due to cold hair, the lights flickered and then completely went out. She looked around and when the doors slid open, she saw a long hallway which looked like the hospital’s instead of the garage. She frowned, getting confused and anxious by the minute.

She walked out of the elevator and took a step towards the hallway, looking around. The furniture was destroyed, thrown away and there was nothing standing in one piece as far as Allison has seen so far.

Allison started walking down the hall, thinking how she was going to hug Stella the minute she saw her cousin. Was that what Stella has been going through? Living with the fear of having a hallucination? It could drive someone nuts enough to check-in in a mental institution. Allison awed one more time about how strong her cousin was.

Young girl stopped covering herself with her arms, fixed the bag on her shoulder, looking around as she kept walking with slow and cautious steps. There was a light wind going through Allison’s dark colored hair, flipping few papers through it.

Allison made her way to the ajar door down the hall and stepped inside the room, taking a deep breath. It was morg and it was a lot cleaner and in one peace than the rest of the hospital.

Allison startled and turned around when the door behind her shut with a loud noise. She gasped in fear and then with another voice, she turned around back.

The second closet door from the left opened up and as Allison walked towards it, she saw the name tag, making her hold her breath in fear: Kate Argent.

And the memories came back, one by one, playing in her head.

_**** When she flew into the guest room with a huge smile on her face screaming, Kate was folding up her clothes out of her suitcase while Stella was sitting on the couch near the door, watching her mother. But when Kate saw Allison, she dropped whatever she was doing and hugged her niece so tightly with laughter but none of them seemed to care since they’ve missed each other like crazy. ****_

_**** “Kate… Kate… what are you doing?” Allison asked, looking at Kate who was pointing her gun at Scott who was laying on the ground in the woods in front of the burned Hale house._

_This was a face of her aunt that she’s never seen before. ****_

_***** “I’m sorry” Kate whispered with Peter’s claws on her throat, ready to tear her apart. “Tell Stella I love her, that I’m sorry.” Before even Allison get a chance to react or say something, Peter pulled his hand back, scratching Kate’s throat, making the blood splash the wall._

_As her lifeless body fell on the ground, Allison gasped still looking at her dead aunt. ****_

She kept looking at the morgue cabinet with these memories flooding through her mind, pressing her lips together into a straight line. Allison took a step forward to the cabinet with confident yet shaky steps not knowing what was happening. Her hand touched the metal surface, pulling it back to herself with the door. It looked empty.

For only few moments…

As she heard Kate’s screams inside and saw her climbing up to her, she closed shut the door with fear and quickly headed for the exit.

Allison stormed out but she heard the school bell ring and all of a sudden, she was in the school, looking at Lydia who was looking at her with a worried and confused expression on her face, concerned about her friend. “Allison, are you okay?” she asked.

As Allison nodded, telling her that she was okay, the way she was breathing was telling the opposite.

When Stiles found Scott, the young alpha was speedily going down the stairs, trying to run away from his monster shadow. What happened to him this morning happened again in the parking lot and what scared the crap out of Scott was that it looked a lot like Peter’s werewolf form.

He saw himself as a monster in his shadow.

“Hey, hey, hey, you alright?” Stiles asked curiously. He came to school about ten minutes ago and was walking around in the campus, looking for Stella. She was supposed to arrive before him but the fact that she was nowhere to be seen or answering any of his calls worried the hell out of him. And as he was looking for her, he found Scott who was also worrying the hell out of him. “You don’t look alright, Scott” Stiles continued when Scott didn’t say anything to answer his question.

“I’m okay” Scott responded like he could make him believe that but he didn’t stand a chance against Stiles. Not that he would believe it himself as well but he didn’t want to worry him more.

“No, you’re not” Stiles said, shaking his head. He knew what was up. He remembered the things he talked with Stella over the phone this morning. “It’s happening to you, too. You’re seeing things, aren’t you?”

“How’d you know?” Scott asked, blinking his eyes.

Stiles shrugged and right he was about to answer him, he got interrupted by Lydia, causing both of them to look at her. “Because it’s all happening to all three of you and probably Stella as well” Lydia anxiously responded to Scott, walking towards them with Allison by her side.

As they all looked at each other, they knew they had to figure this thing out before it was too late.

“Well, well, look who’s no longer the crazy one here?” Lydia sarcastically commented with a teasing smile on her face as all four of them walked inside the school. Stella was still nowhere to be seen and knowing she left the house way before any of them did, Allison and Stiles were a lot more worried. She still wasn’t answering any of their calls.

“We’re not crazy” Allison protested.

Hearing that, Lydia turned to Allison as she raised her eyebrows teasingly. “Hallucinating? Sleep paralysis...” Lydia counted and then continued with the same amount of sarcasm. “Yeah, you guys are fine.”

“We did die and come back to life” Scott reacted, looking at his friend. “That’s gotta have some side effects, right?”

As the school bell rang, they looked up by reflex but then their eyes found each other one more time and Stiles parted his lips. “We keep an eye on each other, okay?” he suggested, his hazel eyes moving between Allison, Scott and Lydia. “Also…” His tongue moved on his lips nervously as he continued. “Whoever hears from Stella first, tell the others. She should’ve been in school by now.” They all nodded, confirming him. Stiles rubbed his hands to each other and then looked at Lydia showing how annoyed he was of her attitude. “And Lydia, stop enjoying this so much.”

Stiles started walking away from them to get to his class, leaving Lydia behind with a frown. She slightly lifted her head up and teasingly questioned. “Why?”

Stella was walking fast down the hall, trying to get to the History class which was the first class of the day, trying to hold the curses leave her mouth but failing miserably as she murmured things that would make a sailor very proud.

When that wolf showed itself again, only few minutes later causing her to crash her car into the one in front of her on the road. The guy turned out to be a dick and took this non-sense to the police station even though there was hardly a scratch and she hated every second of it. But since Sheriff Stilinski knew what was happening… it was a lot harder to deny everything when he was almost sacrificed for the supernatural… he saved Stella’s ass. But the attitude of the other guy bugged Stella so much that she actually had to bite her tongue so that she wouldn’t punch him or even kill him.

Well… At least, hospitalize him.

So naturally, she kept cursing but as she stood in front of the class, she took a deep breath to calm herself down and closed her eyes. When she opened them back on and slowly stepped into the class. The teacher wasn’t there yet so without saying anything she walked over to her seat which was left empty and right next to Stiles who was probably kept the seat empty. As she sat down, she could feel Stiles’ gaze on her, watching her every move with his eyebrows raised up. 

He was waiting for an explanation.

Young Argent rolled her eyes, slammed her book onto the desk angrily and then turned to Scott and Stiles who were still looking at her but startled with the slam on the desk by the book. “I was at the police station” she explained but Stiles rolled his eyes at the lack of information that came from Stella and waved his hands in the air, asking her for more information. Stella, feeling the anger inside her, rolled her eyes but continued as she was demanded. “I’ve seen a fucking hallucination that was different from the other hallucinations, alright? Then I crashed that goddamn jeep in front of me. The guy was a total dick and in an _if I didn’t know your dad, he would do anything to put me in jail_ kind of way.” Even before she started explaining Scott and Stiles knew she was pissed but there was something else that caught their attention.

“What do you mean by a different kind of hallucination?” Scott asked, knotting and creating a worried and confused v between his eyebrows. Right when Stella was about to answer him, a guy walked in, making Stella to press her lips together in frustration and turned around to the white board. The guy was dressed in suit, hair combed and the way he looked, Stella could guess he was originally from either Japan, China or Korean.

Stiles rolled his eyes when he saw Stella turned around and got interrupted by the guy who was obviously their new history teacher after what happened to Mr. Westover last semester. The new teacher gave out his breath, smiled and started talking. “Good morning, everyone” he said, hitting his hands to each other. He had a sincere smile and a positive energy and even a bit, Stella felt less angry. Just a bit… “My name is Mr. Yukimura.” He started pacing around the class as he kept telling about himself. “I’ll be taking over your previous history teacher. My family and I’ve moved here three weeks ago. I’m sure, by now, you all know my daughter Kira. Or you might not since she’s never actually mentioned anyone from school. Or brought a friend home for that matter.” As he sighed, Kira banged his head to the desk, covering herself with her arms above her head. Stella hearing that sound, just like everyone else in the class, she turned around to see the young girl who was sitting way behind in the back only to see her black long hair. She smiled softly and then turned around and put one of her leg over the other, nervously shaking her right one. She looked at her notebook with her chin on her fist and elbow on the desk as she heard Mr. Yukimura’s voice. “Either way, there she is.” He was looking at his daughter with proud eyes as he pointed her. Stella looked at the young girl again, this time seeing her face that held a shy smile. She was cute, had the same eye shape as her father.

Stiles and Stella looked at her for only few seconds and then turned around but Scott’s eyes were still on her. Stella smiled teasingly as she poked Scott with her pen. “Hey, Wolfy” she said, getting his attention on herself. Scott turned to look at her, trying to hide his smile. Both of their brown eyes met together, Stella turned her smile into a teasing grin. “You’re gonna scare the poor new girl away.” As she turned to board again, not breaking the sarcastic smile, she knew she felt a lot more relaxed than this morning.

“Now, let’s begin with American History at the turn of 20th century” Mr. Yukimura said as Scott turned around but had to hold his breath as he saw the shape of his shadow again. The thing he was scared that might turn to... A monster…

“Stella is at the school” Lydia informed Allison, reading the text message that came from Stiles few seconds ago. They were in the art class, pairing up as Lydia was watching over her. She sighed, sliding her phone back into her purse and then lifting her head up to look at Allison as she continued. “She is with Scott and Stiles now. Stiles said, she is fine.”

“That’s good” Allison murmured, lost in her thoughts. She pressed her lips together as her eyes focused on the canvas. She was nervous and her hands were shaking but it wasn’t because of her mental state. It was probably another side effect since her hands have been like that for the last couple of days.

The brush covered in red paint was shaking alongside with her hand.

Lydia looked at Allison’s hands, confused and worried about her yet again. “Not the steadiest hand for a superb marksman” Lydia concernedly commented, looking at her friend.

“It’s been happening for the past few weeks” Allison said, not looking away from the canvas in front of her. She quickly pulled her brush back and added. “Since that night.” As the brush fell down into the paint, the red colored splashed and covered the paper. It only reminded her Kate’s blood on the wall and the hallucination she saw this morning and looking at the canvas pretty spaced out.

Noticing that, Lydia tore it apart and revealed a white, empty paper, making Allison flinch with the sudden movement in front of her. “Start over” she ordered, supporting her best friend in the way she needed. Allison inhaled, grabbing the brush again. Lydia sat back down, meanwhile Isaac was looking at Allison across the classroom, trying to make sure if she was okay.

“What’d you mean? It felt real?” Scott asked curiously, raising his eyebrows as his eyes were on Stella who was quickly started to get interrogated by Scott and Stiles the second history class was over.

“Yeah” Stella responded to him, following the boys to Stiles’ locker. After that, they were gonna head to Stella’s since she had to leave her history book and get her… Well, she had to check her schedule to find out which book she had to get. “And the scariest part was that there was nothing I could do to snap out of it, you know, there was no scream, no nothing. Every hallucination of mine ends up with me screaming like a lunatic and me finding a dead body.” She nervously scoffed and continued. “Now I am happy with the fact that there was no dead body but no scream means something else and I… I don’t know. It almost felt like the wolf had the whole control.”

Stiles frowned, looking at her. “A wolf?” he asked, raising his eyebrows at the same time. “You saw a wolf?”

“Yes!” Stella couldn’t help but scream which startled Stiles a bit and made few people look at them as they were walking down the hall. Stella couldn’t be more careless as she kept talking. The others looked away only seconds later anyway. “A fucking wolf with dark brown colored fur and blue-ish red colored eyes.” As she felt Scott and Stiles looking at her, guessing what they were going to say, Stella rolled her eyes and leaned against the locker that was right next to Stiles’ and looked at them. “Ah, don’t Captain America me.” As she referred to a scene in the movie Age of Ultron, Scott softly smiled and Stiles rolled his eyes but the only reason to that was he and she were similar to each other and for some reason, getting attacked by his own weapon of annoyance bugged him but that was also one of the reasons why they were close friends.

“Maybe we need a little more time to get back to normal” Scott reacted as Stiles reached out for the lock on his locker. Stella was looking at the people walking in the hallways, talking and at the same time, she was listening to Scott.

That’s why when she heard Scott, she softly laughed and didn’t startle. “Yeah, right” Stella murmured sarcastically as she slowly turned her head to look at Scott. She sighed and got back to looking at the face for some reason that she didn’t know. She shrugged. “Try not to forget we hit the reset button on a supernatural beacon for supernatural creatures.”

Stiles nodded Stella, showing he agreed with her. “Yeah, there’s a pretty good chance that things are never going back to normal” he commented, still trying to open his locker.

“Yeah” Scott whispered and then nodded. Stella softly sighed, thinking about the things she had read on the Argent bestiaries and other hunter families’ journals. Knowing all the information she did, a lot could happen in their situation.

Meanwhile Stiles was still struggling with his lock and as he looked at it, he saw nothing but weird symbols making him frowned in confusion. “What the hell?” he murmured while Scott kept looking at a distance, listening in on the Yukimura’s, and Stella was waiting for Stiles to be done with it already so that she could shove her book into her locker. But as soon as she saw Stiles’ soft whisper, she turned to look at Stiles and then down to what he was looking at. The way he was looking at the locker worried Stella, but she didn’t put much thought into it as she moved her eyebrows and turned her head but doing that, she saw something else.

Scott’s eyes suddenly started to glow red.

“Scott” Stella murmured in alert, straightening her back. Scott took a deep breath, turning his head to look at her, and hearing Stella calling Scott’s name and Scott’s breathing caught Stiles’ attention, making him to look at them and see what was happening. “Scott, your eyes.”

“What about them?” Scott asked curiously, not knowing what they were talking about.

“They’re starting to glow” Stiles said, not losing any time.

“You mean like right now?” Scott asked, following up to his best friend’s heated mood, he was pretty scared, but his question made Stella open her eyes wide open with a question of are you being real.

“No, Scott,” she started, nearly screaming. “They texted me, they’re gonna start glowing in a few hours.” She pressed her lips together with anger and fear that someone was going to see them. “Are you serious? Of course, right now!” she screamed with a low voice. “Do something before someone sees it. Stop it!”

Scott started covering his glowing red eyes with his hands. “I can’t, I can’t control it!” he exclaimed, starting to panic through his heavy breathes. Stiles looked around and used his bag and jacket to cover Scott’s face as Stella started running, following them.

“Alright, just keep your head down. Look down, come on” Stiles said, guiding Scott down the hall. “Keep your head down!” They quickly walked inside an empty classroom. Scott quickly threw his bag to the floor, took his shirt off, only staying in his t-shirt and walked away from Stiles. Stella closed the door behind them and stood next to Stiles.

“Get back away from me!” he yelled, slowly turning into a werewolf, growling.

“Scott, it’s okay” Stiles said, trying to help his friend out and calm him at the same time, walking towards him as he left Stella behind. 

Stella was looking at the scene in front of her, feeling the lump in her throat. Before she came to Beacon Hills, she never thought she was gonna have friends like that. Friends that she could call them family. In New York, she was mostly hanging around with the wrong people and she was also one of them. If they ever hear a siren, they wouldn’t care about anything. Everyone was saving their own asses. Stella included. She’s always been a lone wolf. She didn’t know otherwise but now as she kept looking at Scott who she saw as her brother, she wanted to help him but she didn’t know how to.

All she knew that she could never leave him alone dealing with this. 

“I don’t know what’s going to happen” Scott shouted, still walking away from them in the class as far as he could. “Get back!”

“Scott” Stella interrupted without her control as she took a step forward. She heard Scott growling, his fangs were already out and him being an alpha wasn’t making things easier for any of them as well. “Focus. You figured out all of this…” She drew a circle in the air with her hands in the meaning of his situation. “… Werewolf things a year ago. You can control it now. You have the freaking control, don’t ever forget that.” She took a deep breath. As she sighed, Stiles’ eyes were moving between Scott and Stella. “Focus on my voice, alright? Think about your anchor. The thing, the monster you saw on your shadow, is not you and never will be you. That’s why you became the True Alpha. That’s why you let Deucalion go and spared his life.” Stella stopped, gulped as she pressed her lips together. She sharply exhaled through her nose. “I would never do that. You need to believe me, Scott. That’s not you. Take the fucking control. You just… you just have to.”

Young alpha heard Stella, tried to focus on her voice and then, all of a sudden, he squeezed his hands, making his claws go deeper into his palms making them bleed. As Stella and Stiles kept looking at him with worried expressions on their faces, Scott growled, he showed his fangs and fell down onto his knees.

Few seconds later, he was human gain.

Stiles put his bag on the ground and stepped towards Scott as he lifted his head to look at them, taking deep breathes. “Pain makes you human” he murmured as Stella and Stiles kneeled down in front of him.

“Scott, this isn’t just in our heads” Stiles said, looking at his best friend. “This is real. It made you turn out uncontrollably out of nowhere and Stella had a car accident because of it. And…” He took a breath and continued. “And it’s starting to get bad for me too. I’m not just having nightmares. I’m having dreams where I have to literally scream myself awake. And sometimes I’m not even sure if I’m actually ever waking up.”

“What do you mean?” Scott questioned curiously, worried about Stiles as his breathings finally went back to a normal pace.

“Do you know how you can tell if you’re dreaming?” Stiles asked, looking at him.

“You’d have extra fingers, or you can’t read” Stella murmured, looking at Stiles.

Young man nodded. “More and more, the past few days…” he continued, explaining his situation as his gaze moved on his friends. “I’ve been having trouble of reading.” He looked down at his hands. “It’s like I can’t see the words, I can’t put the letters in order.”

“Like even now?” Scott asked, frowning as he was looking at Stiles with a worried expression on his face. Stella had the same in her eyes, watching Stiles stand up and look at the board in front of him on the wall. The letters were almost like flying around, not making sense.

Stiles sighed. “I can’t read a thing.”

After that incident in the class, Scott went to his class and Stella stayed with Stiles to get to their next class together after stopping at Stella’s locker first. The whole way, Stiles kept asking more questions to understand what happened to them and finally it caused Stella put her books on the desk when they were on their seats. She rolled her eyes and she turned her head to look at Stiles who was sitting right next to her. “What more do I need to tell you?” she almost shouted with frustration. She raised her eyebrows and kept her gaze on Stiles. “My whole life?”

Stiles’ eyes opened widely in disbelief, looking at her and parted his lips to talk. “Was the wolf familiar, even a little bit? Was it a normal wolf, or not?” he asked question after question with his hands joining the heated conversation between two friends. Stella closed her eyes, taking deep breathes to calm her nerves. “Details, Stella, freaking details! Every detail count, and any of them can be a clue.”

“How a goddamn wolf can be a clue, Stilinski?” Stella asked, opening her eyes back. She brushed her hair back with frustration as she sighed and continued. “I-I don’t know, alright?” She pulled her shoulders up. “All I know is that it wasn’t normal wolf. Its eyes were glowing something, like, a combination of blue and red.” She shrugged. “I’ve never seen a werewolf that can shift into an actual wolf, so, it wasn’t familiar at all.” She sighed. “Besides, they are very rare. The last one was Talia Hale and my psychopath mother killed her in a fire.”

Stiles nodded, not knowing what to say but lucky for him, their Math teacher barged into the classroom, immediately starting the lesson so that he didn’t have a choice but to shut up which was relief to Stella at the moment as her hand went through her brown hair, focusing on the math question that the teacher was writing on the board but that focus didn’t take long.

She heard a voice calling out for her when she was writing the question down, making her startle as she straightened up. “Stella.” She looked around, lifting her head up and started looking around but all she saw was the teacher in front of the board and students writing the question down. The familiarity of the voice caused Stella to start breathing shakily. “Stella!”

When she heard the voice again, her head quickly turned to left and all of a sudden, she was no longer in the class, sitting on her desk.

Her heart started pounding with the thought of what was happening, knowing what was actually happening. _No, no… this can’t be happening again_ , she thought but she knew it was happening.

She found herself in that black room again. There was a white spotlight shinning on her, being the only light source in the room. She was wearing a white, soft dress instead of her jeans and white shirt with black leather jacket that she was pretty sure left the house with. Her hair was coming down to her chest like a cloud and she was also pretty sure she put it in a ponytail after that incident with Scott.

Stella gulped, looking around and saw that white door again and a short staircase that led to it.

She started walking with deep and shaky breathes. She took the stairs up and reached for the handle, grabbing it and pulling it to herself, seeing the hallway behind the door which looked like in Beacon Hills Memorial.

Following her breathes, Stella’s hands started shaking along with them. She hated those hallucinations. She didn’t know what they were, why this was all happening to her and she just wanted out of them. She was scared. She felt helpless and vulnerable.

Young girl started walking down the cold hallways of the hospital. There was a light but cold wind blowing her hair. “Stella.” She stopped hearing the voice again. She looked around, trying to understand where the voice was coming from, but the corridor looked abandoned. Stella covered her body wrapping her arms around herself and for a second, questioned the reason of the dress but that was until the voice spoke again like a whisper. “I’m here, Stella.” She startled but at the same time she noticed the ajar door ahead.

She started walking towards it with cautious steps, her heart pounding like crazy.

Stella took a deep breath. The voice belonged to her mother which was the reason that she was so creeped out about this. Hearing Talia was one thing, but hearing her mom who was a human when she died? How could it be her voice? She was in the funeral, having an argument with her grandfather.

It was a vivid memory in her mind.

She took a deep breath, walking inside the room to see the morgue of the hospital as she gave it out. The room was a lot colder than the rest of the hospital, covered with iron metal cabinets that held the dead people inside.

Stella frowned as she remembered Allison’s texts. One of the things that scared the crap out of her was this… the fact that Allison’s hallucination this morning sounded a lot like the one she was having right now.

Stella started walking towards one of the cabinets, seeing one of them is partly open. As she started shivering, she saw the name tag: Kate Argent… She gulped; she knew what was going to happen. She walked over to the cabinet, grabbed the door and pulled it to herself opening it. It was empty, there was no voice but it only lasted few seconds. Stella gasped, seeing her mother climbing up with a scary face and a scream.

That’s when she screamed her lungs out.

Everyone stopped doing whatever they were doing and covered their ears with the sudden loud voice. Stiles closed his eyes down as well as his ears, folding down to cover himself. The windows kept shaking, almost at a breaking point.

Meanwhile Stiles wasn’t the only one who heard Stella’s scream. Lydia startled as she closed her eyes two floors above her. Isaac looked at the door in the same floor. Scott lifted his head up from the notebook he was looking at being a floor below her, and even though they were all doing different things, they all had the same thought as they murmured. “Stella.”

“Lydia, are you sure we need to do this?” Allison asked as Lydia was walking towards the tree ahead with a target that she was holding between her hands so that she could hang it on the tree and Allison could practice shooting it. “I need to be with Stella right now.”

“Stiles is already with her” Lydia murmured, responding to Allison as she stood in front of the tree. “She’ll be fine.” She hung the target on the tree and turned around, pointing Allison. “And you…” She put down her finger and started walking towards her. “You need to do this.”

“Do you really think this is going to help?” Allison questioned, being skeptical about all of this. She was holding her crossbow between her hands and there were arrows near her feet on the ground.

“I know that if you think it’s not going to help, it definitely won’t” Lydia reacted, standing right next to her friend and looking at her teasingly. Her green eyes looked at the target she hung up and as Allison kneeled down to grab her first arrow to shoot, Lydia cleared her throat and opened her lips. “So, get your head into it. Shoot a few and see what happens.”

Allison took a deep breath, placing the arrow into the crossbow and as she pulled, stretching the bow and then release the arrow.

It didn’t hit the target.

Allison sighed, grabbed another arrow, did the same thing but this time the arrow went right into the ground few inches away from the tree, making Lydia to sigh and slightly frown her brows. “Maybe hold the string a different way” she suggested, looking at the spot arrow stuck into. Allison bit her lips as she turned her head to look at Lydia, who was thinking with her finger near her lips. “Try the Mongolian draw.” Allison’s expression changed to asking how the hell she knew that, making Lydia to look at her. “What?” She softly and sarcastically chuckled. “I read.” Swung her finger to the right. “Try it.” Allison took another arrow from the ground and did what Lydia told her to. This time, they didn’t even see where the arrow went. Lydia took a deep breath and looked at Allison. “Okay, um, take a second to close your eyes…” She placed her hands-on Allison’s shoulder and slid it down while Allison was doing what she was told to do and closed her eyes as she took a deep breath. “… and imagine the arrow going into the target.”

Allison heard Lydia but it was like she was talking to her from the end of a tunnel, echoing.

When she opened her eyes back, she saw someone running behind the trees, but it was only for a moment. She could swear it looked like Kate, but it couldn’t have been. It was impossible. She startled, gulping down in confusion and fear and slightly parted her lips. “Did you see that?” she frightenedly asked.

“See what?” Lydia said in confusion.

But without answering her, Allison grabbed another arrow from the ground and grabbed her quiver and hung it on her back and then without turning around to look at her, she started talking. “Wait here.”

“Are you serious?”

Allison looked at her friend, trying to give her comfort. “I’ll be right back.”

She started walking away from her, causing Lydia to suck breath in between her teeth and her hands curled up into a fist as she was staring at Allison behind her. “You did not just say that.”

Meanwhile Allison was walking slowly into the woods, walking on the leaves, trying to see what she saw few seconds earlier. “Over here” someone whispered behind her. Allison turned to see but there was no one. Something she was sure of, though.

It was her aunt, Kate Argent.

“Lydia?” Allison yelled out, now looking for the young girl but she was nowhere to be seen as well.

“Allison, over here” Kate said again, Allison was turning around to see the source of the voice, her aunt, but she couldn’t. “Over here, Allison. Allison, over here. Allison. I’m here.” Allison started breath heavily, she was looking around seeing nothing but trees.

“Lydia!” She called for her and all of a sudden, it was night time. There were scary and weird noises coming out from the woods. Allison turned around and saw her aunt running to her looking like a ghoul with her eyes and her hair. She quickly placed her arrow and stretched the bow and then released it.

If it weren’t for Isaac, Lydia was going to die with an arrow in the face.

Lydia startled, gasping and taking a deep breath as Isaac stopped the arrow only few inches away from her face.

Allison snapped out of the hallucination, saw what happened. “Oh my God” she said, the minute she realized what she did. Put her arrow and bow down with her shaky hands and then put her hands up in the air. “Oh my God, Lydia!”

“Right at her head?” Scott asked in disbelief looking at Isaac who rushed to Scott’s house to tell him what happened in the woods today after school.

“Almost right through it” Isaac confirmed the young alpha. As Scott sighed, still sitting on his bed, Isaac continued. “And she keeps saying the same thing, that she keeps seeing her aunt.”

Scott, remembering what Stella told her in the school, opened her eyes widely in shock as he lifted his head up look at Isaac. “Stella said the same thing, that she saw her mother in her hallucination in math class” he murmured worriedly, looking at Isaac who was nodding at him, confirming him. 

“Whatever’s happening to you guys is getting worse.” The look and the expression on his face was just showing Scott how worried he was of the Argent girls who were he was a lot closer with. “This morning it caused Stella to get in an accident, and if I hadn’t been there, then Lydia would be dead.” Even though Scott was about to nod, he stopped.

Something caught his attention as he looked back at Isaac, he frowned. “What were you doing there?”

This question caught Isaac off guard. He opened his lips to explain but nothing came out but Scott already knew the answer. He grabbed him again by the shirt and threw it to the same wall as this morning.

As the painting fell second time today, Melissa’s exhausted voice came up from downstairs, reaching to them. “Oh, you guys, come on!” Melissa yelled out. “This house doesn’t have a supernatural ability to heal! So, stop it!”

After school, Stella decided to join Stiles as he was going to the Police Station to meet up with his father. One of the reasons why she decided to go with him was that the others didn’t want Stella to be alone after the hallucination in the school and Stiles didn’t leave her alone for even a second.

Well, he waited in front of the ladies’ room and them having the same classes for the day helped him with this genius plan of his.

The second reason was the fact that Lydia was with Allison and Isaac was Scott which left two walking dead that were Stiles and Stella. They were going to look after each other for the rest of the day because that was what would happen if you were to die to save your ‘guardians’ and that way hit the reset button to a supernatural tree and end up becoming one of the followings listed above.

  1. A) controlled werewolf to randomly shifting werewolf.
  2. B) a perfect huntress to Ms. Shaky Hands.
  3. C) someone who couldn’t even tell if they are awake.
  4. D) someone who was seeing a supernatural wolf in a country that didn’t even have normal wolves.



It was just a regular Tuesday night for Stiles, Stella, Scott and Allison.

“You’re making me regret my decision” Stiles complained as he took a deep breath and looked at the young girl who was sitting on the passenger seat from the corner of his eyes. Ever since they got inside the jeep, they were arguing and messing with each other and meanwhile Stella was totally having fun with that, Stiles wasn’t so much.

Towards the end at least…

“I didn’t tell you to be my guardian angel” Stella said, letting her hand out of the window to feel the wind on her skin. “Besides, I’ve been having these hallucinations for almost a year and I’m still alive.” She scoffed. “Thank God.” She looked at him. “You know, the only reason why I’m here because you are the only Walking Dead left, so you’re stuck with me and I’m stuck with you, so, suck it up Stilinski.” Stiles rolled his eyes but nodded, knowing that.

He parked the blue jeep in front of the station, and they walked in together as they both sighed. 

“You know the last time we bought one of these to her grave was stolen the same day” Stiles said, fixing the flowers in front of him which was on the desk and inside a vase. “Hundred bucks down the drain.”

Stella frowned, looking at him from the seat she was laying on inside the Sheriff’s office. “You paid hundred bucks for a bouquet?” she questioned curiously. Not that she was judging or anything. It was just that, she never had someone to pay hundred bucks for.

Maybe her grandmother but her grave was in France since she was French. They only had her ashes back in New York.

Stiles nodded, taking a breath between his teeth. Stella moved her eyebrows and then started texting with a friend of hers who was a hunter and named Danielle. She was working on a case with another hunter who she barely knew, John Winchester. She knew him from Gerard and Chris and knew him enough to know he was a douchebag and probably a bad father. So, she wasn’t really curious about him. But apparently, there were even things that he wasn’t aware of and Danielle, knowing Stella was in this mess, she decided to text her to give her a shot. And now as Stella was texting her and tell her what they were supposed to do, she was also listening to the sheriff and Stiles.

Stiles turned back to the flowers but when he noticed his dad was up to something behind the desk, he leaned in to see what was happening. He frowned. “Hey, dad?” Stiles was looking at the sheriff who was buried in files. “Hi, what are you doing down there?” he asked when Sheriff turned his head to look at him. Hearing that, Stella was curious too. As she stood up, she typed out **just cut the head, dumbasses and I mean the monster’s head, not the Winchester’s.**

She hit sent, hoping there were no typos and slid it back into her pocket as she stood up from the couch and walked over to the desk, looking at the sheriff. “Yeah, sheriff” she murmured with a question, seeing all those files. “What’s up with the files?”

“Working” Sheriff answered them, not giving much clue for them to work on. As he continued, Stella and Stiles looked at each other, dropping their shoulders as they sighed. “And hey, if somebody wants the flowers that badly, they can have them. It’s the gesture.”

Stiles nodded, walking around the table and stood behind his dad, looking at the files while Stella sat on the sheriff’s desk, not really caring about if this was appropriate or not. They were both looking at the files that Sheriff was looking at when she decided to speak. “Hey, Sheriff, don’t mean to interfere in your job or anything, and I am very grateful for what you did for me this morning, but, uh…” Stella slowly licked her lips, probably thinking the same thing as Stiles. She pointed the files in the room and then continued talking. “What is all this? What are you trying to do?”

“I’ve been looking over some old cases from a more illuminated perspective” Sheriff answered the young girl. He turned around to look at his son and Stella for a second. “If you know what I mean.”

Stella leaned over the desk and grabbed a red file. “Strange sighting of a bipedal lizard man sprinting across freeway” she read the file and as she wrinkled her lips, slowly shake the file in the air and looked at the Sheriff. “Kanima pile?”

“Kanima pile” Sheriff confirmed her, pointing the spot. Stella pressed her lips together and shook her head and threw the file onto the post Sheriff pointed at.

Stiles kneeled down, next to his dad. “Dad, you’re not going back through all your old cases seeing if any of them had something to do with the supernatural, are you?” he curiously questioned. Meanwhile Stella stood up and walked over to the other side of the table and scanned the other files. She saw some other Kanima pile, some werewolf pile and even some demon pile as well.

“I admit the recent opening of my eyes to the greater mysteries of the universe has got me reassessing” Sheriff started explaining as he looked up at his son. “There’s at least 100 cases here where I look at the details and I can ask myself… _If I knew then what I know now_.”

“Right, but are you sure you wanna go down that path?” Stiles asked, crossing his arms in front of his chest and his right hand’s fingers moving closer to his lips. He was worried about his father which was understandable in their situation.

“Do I have a choice?” Sheriff asked this time, looking at them. “There’s one case in particular that I can’t get out of my head.” Sheriff grabbed the file and stood up with it in his hand. “Eight years ago, I was elected Sheriff of Country, my first official duty was to tell a man…” He showed the file to Stella and Stiles who were listening him carefully. There was a picture of a girl who couldn’t have been older than 12. “… that not only had his wife and two kids died in a car accident, but, as best we could tell, the body of his 9-year-old daughter had been dragged from the wreck by coyotes.”

“You mean dragged and eaten?” Stiles asked, lifting his head up from the file and looking at his father who was standing in front of them with his arms crossed in front of his chest.

“We didn’t find the car until three days after the crash” Sheriff said, answering Stiles’ question. He continued. “They had driven off the road into a pretty deep ravine. Two bodies that were still in the car were covered in bites and slashes.”

“So, you’re thinking bites and claw marks… probably a werewolf attack?” Stella questioned as she raised her eyebrows. Her gaze moved away from the file and fell on Sheriff, waiting for his answer.

Sheriff Stilinski nodded. “Maybe.”

“But coyotes, they scavenge, right?” Stiles responded, his eyes moving between Stella and his dad. “So, couldn’t they have just left the bites and the slashes?”

“Absolutely” Sheriff confirmed, shaking his head yes. But after stopping to catch a breath, he continued. He patted softly with his finger on the part of a paragraph on the file. “But guess what night the accident occurred on?”

Stella sighed, reading what sheriff showed them. “The night of a full Moon” She said with a deep breath.

“Yeah” sheriff said as Stiles closed the file and put it back on the table and then he looked around, frowning and noticing something else in his dad’s office.

“Hey, dad, where are all these going?” he asked.

“Yeah, we, uh…” Sheriff sighed. Stella caught the name Agent McCall on one of the boxes. “We probably need to talk about that.”

As the school bell rang, he quickly stepped inside the classroom and walked over to his usual sit only to see someone was sitting there. “Hi, sorry, I usually sit there” Stiles said to the girl, trying to be nice. And when she used sign language instead of speaking, Stiles stopped and took a deep breath. Of course, now he wasn’t going to ask her to find another seat. “Okay, no problem. That’s all yours.” She slightly smiled and walked two seats behind and sat down. He put his books on the desk and as he was flipping through pages, he noticed something awkward. No one was speaking, everything was dead silent. Everyone was looking directly at the board like they were in some kind of trance or something. Stiles cleared his throat. “That’s weird” he murmured when he saw Coach had the exact same expression. He was looking directly at Stiles without even blinking and it was pretty creepy. “Hey, Coach. Thought I was in the wrong class for a second.”

And then Coach started talking in sign language.

He put his one finger up, draw a circle with the another and tapped on it. Then, he showed Stiles his palms and moved one of them back to his chest and the other away from him. “Um, okay.” Coach brought his thumb to his lips and then back, put his palms next to each other, opening and closing the gap between them. “I don’t actually know sign language.” Coach kept doing the same things, some movements over and over again. “Actually, I didn’t know that you knew sign language.” Coach kept getting faster. “Or that… that was even an elective.” Coach started from the beginning again, making Stiles to swallow hard in fear. “Well, this has been good, I’m probably gonna, uh, head out.” Stiles quickly grabbed his books and notebooks and stood up but Coach kept doing the movements, still talking in sign language. And as Stiles made his way to the door, all class started doing it. He gasped in fear, breathing heavily and panting. He started feeling the panic inside him, his ear started to ring and all of a sudden that noise turned into a whistle.

Stiles snapped out of it with Coach’s whistle. He was sitting on the seat next to Stella’s who was looking at him with a worried expression.

“Stilinski!” Coach yelled out. Stiles took a deep breath. Stella kept looking at her friend worriedly who was wearing a red button up shirt today. Even though, he actually looked good in it, the color of his face and his body language showed otherwise. “I asked you a question.”

“Uh, sorry Coach” Stiles apologized, trying to calm himself down. “What was it?”

“It was ‘Stilinski, are you paying attention back there?’” he repeated, smiling in a non-friendly and sarcastic way. As the rest of the class were covering their mouths to hide their smiles, Stella gave out a breath as she was looking down at Stiles’ black notebook in concern.

“Oh” he whispered, shaking his pen between his hand nervously. “Well, I am now.”

“Stilinski, stop reminding me why I drink… Every night.” Coach turned back and started talking in a voice that was telling them he was done with this non-sense. “Does anybody else want to try the question on the board.” But Stella couldn’t be more careless about the question on the board or the rest of the lecture. She was looking at Stiles whose elbow was on his desk and his chin was on his fist.

Stiles felt Stella’s eyes on him and turned to look at her. “I’m okay” he said, trying to assure her but it felt like, even he didn’t believe himself when he said it. “I just fell asleep for a second.”

Stella’s levels of worriedness rose up real quick inside her. “Stilinski” Stella softly said, the anxiety was so obvious inside her voice. Stiles quickly turned his head to look at Stella. “You weren’t asleep.”

As she pointed the notebook with her eyes, Stiles turned his head back to look at the notebook in front of him on the desk. He saw how many times he wrote the words ‘ _Wake up’_ on it, realizing what was happening and then quickly shut the notebook down.

“Okay, so, what happens to a person who has a near-death experience and comes out of it seeing things?” Scott asked as he was watching the pen that he was turning around between his fingers but as soon as he asked the question, he lifted his head up and looked at his friends.

They were sitting on a picnic table in the campus, talking about what their next move was gonna be because after the Nemeton incident, they were all pretty messed up. That was the whole topic of this pack meeting as Stiles added, causing Stella to nod as she was looking on a spot on the table spaced out but still aware of the conversation that was happening. “And is unable to tell what’s real or not.”

“And is being haunted by demonic visions of dead relatives?” Allison added as well.

“And someone who goes through all of them?” Stella added, stretching the ‘and’ as he softly hit the table, looking at her friends.

“They’re all locked up because they’re all insane” Isaac responded, lifting his head.

Stiles rolled his eyes as he turned to look at him with an angry expression. “Ha, can you at least try to be helpful, please?” he asked, pointing Isaac with his hand.

“For half of my childhood, I was locked in a freezer” Isaac answered him with the high level of sarcasm. “So, being helpful is kind of a new thing for me.”

“Hey, dude, are you still milking that?” Stiles argued.

“Yeah, maybe I’m still milking that” Isaac argued back. Stiles and Isaac’s little argument caused Stella to roll her eyes in exhaustion. Normally, this thing between them was an entertaining to her, but right now, they had something in their hands, and she’d like to know what it was before she checked herself into a mental institution.

And interrupting their argument, someone walked up to their table. It was the new girl. It took few seconds for Stella to actually remember her name. Kira. Yeah, that was it. “Hi,” she shyly said. As they heard Kira, everyone stopped talking and looked at her. “Hi, sorry. I couldn’t help overhearing what you guys were talking about.” Stella and Lydia shared a small look and then turned their heads to look at the new girl. “And I think I actually might know what you’re talking about. There’s a Tibetan word for it. It’s called Bardo.” Stella, hearing the word… She felt something tingling in the back of her mind but it went as it came and she wasn’t so sure anymore. Meanwhile Kira was still talking. “It literally means ‘in-between state’. The state between life and death.”

“And what do they call you?” Lydia asked, not sure if she could trust her so her voice came out a little harsher than expected. Almost like she wanted her gone.

“Kira” Scott replied with a soft smile, instead of the young girl herself. Kira lightly smiled at Scott who had everyone look at him around the table. “She’s in our History class.” Allison’s expression on her face was questioning how Scott knew that. Yes, she might have been closer to Isaac now but Scott was Allison’s first love and Stella knew she was always gonna have a thing for him. Only thing she didn’t know was the amount but she knew she wasn’t gonna find out about it now so she had to focus on the subject in their hands.

“So, are you talking Bardo in Tibetan Buddhism or Indian?” Stella asked, frowned curiously. Kira was still standing because there was no empty seat for her to sit on but she didn’t seem to mind as she was thinking about the answer to that question.

“Either, I guess” she said. “But all the stuff you guys were just saying? All that happens in Bardo.” Kira was telling all of this like it was out of their curiosity and everything was all good and funny but only if she knew… Because the others in the table weren’t exactly on the same page as she was. “There are different progressive states where you can have hallucinations. Some you see, some you hear. And you can be visited by peaceful and wrathful deities.”

“Wrathful deities?” Isaac interrupted, he pointed Kira with the blue pen he was holding and then kept turning it around between his fingers. “And what are those?”

“Like demons” Kira answered with a smile.

Stella pressed her lips together, shaking her head. “Demons” she repeated, looking at her friends and stopping on Allison who also read the Argent and other families’ bestiaries. “Why the hell not?”

“Hold on” Allison said, thinking of something else like she just realized something important. “If there are different progressive states… then what’s the last one?”

“Death” Kira said, shrugging her shoulder. “You die.”

“It sounds like your subconscious is trying to communicate with you” Deaton told them after hearing about their problem and what the hell they’ve been through for the last couple of weeks since the reset button on a big supernatural tree as they were walking in to the examiner room with Stiles, Scott and Stella behind him.

“Well, how do I tell my subconscious to use a language that I actually know?” Stiles reacted with frustration, exhaustion from everything that’s been going on.

As the three of them stood right in front of Deaton, the doc parted his lips. “Do you remember what the sign language looked like?” he curiously asked. “The placement and the movement of the hands?”

Stella frowned, looking at Deaton curiously. “You know sign language?”

Deaton slightly and sincerely smiled. “I know a little” he said, looking at Stella and then his eyes found Stiles again. He slightly nodded his head at him. “Let me give it a shot.” Stiles put his hands in the air and did the things he remembered. As he kept doing it, Deaton translated it one by one. “When is a door not a door?” Deaton repeated the meaning of the whole sentence.

Hearing that, Stella looked at Stiles. She was as confused as he was. “When is a door not a door?” Stiles asked in disbelief, trying to make it make sense. He blinked, showing him that this wasn’t exactly what he was expecting sign language to translate to.

“When it’s ajar” Scott replied.

“You’re kidding me” Stiles instantly reacted. He couldn’t believe that his broken grapefruit was asking him a riddle. Stella didn’t blame him for the tone in his voice, she was pretty shocked as well. “A riddle? My subconsciousness wants to tell me a riddle?”

“Not necessarily” Deaton started explaining. “When the three of you went under the water and Stella joined you through her mind… when you crossed from unconsciousness to a kind of super-consciousness, you essentially opened a door in your minds.”

“So, what does that mean?” Scott asked curiously, worried about himself and his friends. “The door’s still open?”

“Ajar” Deaton corrected the young alpha.

“A door into our minds?” Stella murmured with fear and shock in her voice. Her eyebrows were slightly away from her eyes, looking at Deaton. “That sounds terrible as it feels.”

Deaton looked at her. “I did tell you it was risky.”

“What do we do about it?” Scott questioned, meanwhile Stella was already thinking about something else that was bugging her.

“Well, that’s difficult to answer” Deaton responded but his expression was telling something else. The doc’s face was softly wrinkled up, his brows were raised up, his lips were pressed together.

Stiles was the first one to notice that. “Oh, no, wait a second” he said, interrupting the black man across him. “I know that look. That’s the _‘I know exactly what’s wrong with you but I have no idea how to fix it’_ look.” 

“One thing I do know is that having an opening like that into your mind, it’s not good” Deaton responded to Stiles’ reaction to the look on his face. “You each need to close that door and you need to do it as soon as possible.”

As Stiles and Scott exchanged a worried look, Stella took a deep breath and slowly cleared her throat to get Deaton’s attention. “Okay, I have a hypothetical question” she murmured but as soon as she realized it was a lot lower that she anticipated, she cleared her throat again and started talking louder. “Let’s say, I, uh… I see something in the middle of the road that’s actually not there but I think it’s there and I think it’s real.” Deaton nodded for her to continue, meanwhile Stiles and Scott were looking at her. “What would happen if…” Deaton frowned. Stella licked and softly bit her lips. “What would happen if I close that door too late or, I, uh… or I never manage to do it? Like ever?”

“You’d come to a state where you can no longer tell what’s real and what’s not” Deaton answered the young girl, confusing Scott.

“What are you saying?” he asked, frowning.

“He is saying that I might stuck in my hallucinations, Scott” Stella answered him, trying to gulp the lump in her throat down. She turned her head to the left to look at Scott and Stiles. The fear in her brown eyes were too obvious as she continued. “Forever.”

As the three of them exited the vet clinic, Stella took a deep breath. She let the fresh air fill her lungs but as she was in mid-exhaling, she saw Sheriff’s car pulling over. They all watched him park the squad car and then watched him climbed out of it. Stiles frowned as he pushed back his running wild thoughts back inside his mind and looked at his father who was walking towards them.

“Dad, what are you doing here?” he asked curiously. Stella was standing right next to Stiles, thinking about what Deaton said but still listening to Sheriff because she was also one of the curious ones of the answer to that question.

“I’m here…” sheriff said, taking a deep breath through his mouth. “… because I could use some help.” He looked at Scott and as he pointed at him with his finger, he continued. “Actually, your help.”

“Why me?” Scott asked, raising up his eyebrows.

“Because eight years ago, almost an entire family died in a car accident” Sheriff explained. “One of the bodies, a young girl named Malia, was never found. There’s enough evidence to have me thinking that a werewolf could have caused the accident, and then dragged her body away.” Stella and Stiles, knowing what Sheriff was talking about, exchanged a look for a split second and then looked at him again, listening carefully. “If you could somehow get a lock on her scent, if you could somehow help me find her body, it might provide the missing clue.”

“But what if it was a werewolf?” Stiles asked, not breaking the eye contact with his father.

“Well, there’s somebody out there who murdered and entire family” Sheriff answered his son, looking at him. “Someone who still needs to be caught.”

Scott and Stiles looked at each other, nodding while Stella licked her lips nervously and turned her head to look at the Stiles’ father. “Hey, sheriff” she started, getting his attention. “Do you mind if I tag alone?” Stiles frowned, hearing that question as he looked at the Argent. For the last couple of days, it almost felt like she was avoiding something, she was avoiding the Argents and Stiles, noticing that, he didn’t know the reason and didn’t have the balls to just ask Stella. So, every time something like that happened, Stiles would just try to ignore it. 

“Not at all, Stella” sheriff replied to her with a smile. Stella nodded a silent thank you, meanwhile thinking he was done here, Scott looked at them and opened his mouth.

“I need to go to the hospital to get my mom dinner, but I’ll meet you tomorrow” he said and with sheriff’s confirmation, he hopped on his bike and drove away. Meanwhile, Stella turned to Stiles.

Knowing Scott was going to the hospital, Stiles was his only shot.

“Hey, Stilinski” Stella said, poking Stiles with her elbow. When he turned to look at her, Stella continued. “Can you give me a lift home?”

“Yeah, sure” Stiles responded, slightly nodding. Sheriff waved them goodbye and as he got back in the squad car, Stiles and Stella made their way towards the blue jeep but before they got inside, Stiles looked at the young Argent above her car and curiously asked. “What happened to your car?” He has noticed that Stella’s not been using her own car for the last two days, since the new term started. It was either Chris’ or she’d come to school with Allison but not a sight of her own black Toyota.

While Stiles kept looking at Stella who was pretty messed up after that question as she thought about the answer, he frowned seeing the change on her expression. Out of nervousness, she started biting her inner cheek, feeling Stiles’ hazel eyes on herself. She cleared her throat and looked back at her friend. “I, uh…” Her tongue nervously moved on her lips. “It broke down in the middle of the road few days ago. I just had time to send it to the mechanic, so…”

The fact that she’s explained the situation without giving him any more details caused Stiles to drew his eyebrows together and kept his gaze on his girl best friend. “If it broke down in the middle of the road, then why we-” Stiles stopped in mid-sentence with a thought popped in his head, looking at Stella. A soft smile appeared on his face vaguely as he frowned. Stella sighed, knowing what was up next and knowing he was probably right. “We don’t know about it because you called _him_ , didn’t you?”

Stella knew what he was referring to with the word ‘him’ but she tried to play dumb this time since she didn’t have the strength to talk about _him_. “I called who?” she asked but it only ended up with Stiles tilting his head and keep looking at him, demanding for answers that he already knew.

Stella took a deep breath, looking down at her hands as the memory flashed back in her mind.

_**** Stella angrily cursed with frustration when her car let her down in the middle of the road, causing her to punch the steering few times. “God damn it!” she yelled out as she tried to start the engine again and again but nada… Nothing was happening. It was making some weird noises and then stopping again. And then the white cloud of smoke started rising from the hood where the engine was stored in. “Oh, you little piece of…”_

_Stella quickly grabbed her bag and phone and got out of the car, swearing and cursing._

_She gave out a deep, strong breath from her nose, trying to control her breathing and anger but she was failing miserably at both of them. “You…Ugh!” She cursed about a lot of things and mostly at the fact that the only thing she knew about cars was how to change a tire._

_The only not broken thing about this stupid car right now was the stupid tires._

_She closed her eyes, taking a deep breath in. When she opened her brown eyes back, she looked around. She was in the middle of nowhere with full of large trees and only with a moonlight. There was no else besides her on the road, not yet anyway. Seeing all that, she threw her bag on the top of the car and grabbed her phone, pressing the contacts symbol. She kept cursing but suddenly paused as she saw_ his _name. Her fingered lingered above the name and before her finger touched the name, she sighed. Last time she talked to him was a week ago and they had fun. It was an obvious fact that they were a lot better now but she was still having some troubles with her thoughts._

_She sighed as she pressed on his name and took the phone to her ear. Few seconds later, he picked up the call and Stella heard his sleepy, raspy voice in her ear as she was nervously biting her lip. “Stella? What’s… What time is it? What’s wrong?”_

_“Aiden” she quickly found herself saying, almost interrupting him because she was a nervous wreck at the moment. “Hey, uhm…” Then she stopped, thinking to herself. She questioned why she called him out of all those people she could be calling right now. She slowly bit her lower lip and then continued. “You know what? Never mind. It’s pretty late. You go back to bed. I… I should’ve never both-”_

_Aiden could see her struggle even when without actually seeing her face. He had no idea what was happening and he was probably miles away from her but there was no way in hell he was going to let her hung up on him. It was a lot harder for Stella to care about someone else besides her cousin and he knew that. “Stella” Aiden sharply and determinedly said, interrupting the young girl who was trying to find ways to end the call. “Tell me what’s wrong.”_

_Stella exhaled loudly from her nose and looked at the white cloud rising from her car that was, probably… totally… definitely wrecked and done. “I, uh…” She started, brushing her hair back nervously as she looked around and sighed. “I was going somewhere and my car broke down and I may be a genius in a lot of stuff but I really don’t get cars and their stupid goddamn mechanisms.” She remembered to breath. “I was just calling to ask if you could come here, you know, pick me up or I don’t know. It’s stupid. You were obviously sleeping.” Then she remembered something else. “Oh, my God. You just came back from… Aiden, I’m so sorry… I’ll… I’ll let you sleep. I’m gonna call Ally or… you know what? I’m going to wake Stiles up, I-”_

_Aiden interrupted Stella again, causing her to catch her breath. She could never remember a moment where she was this nervous and it was also a new feeling for her. Getting nervous while talking to someone she knew… “First, breath, okay?” Stella heard his chuckled as she breathed in and out the way she was told, making Aiden to chuckle again. As he continued, she felt a lot calmer. “I came back few hours ago and I’ve had few hours of good sleep, okay? Now, if you can tell me exactly where you are, I am pretty sure I can make it there.” ****_

“Yes, okay, yes” Stella shouted in defeat, throwing her hands in the air. “I called him.” Stella tried to get rid of the anxiousness that she had in her as she sharply exhaled again and got inside the jeep. Stiles followed her, sitting on the driver seat but as he started the engine but as he kept looking at Stella, she knew he wanted her to continue so… she continued. “I mean… I called him, yes… But only because his name was on the top and I couldn’t think straight because of the anger and...” She exhaled, dropped her shoulders as she played with her fingers, her gaze down. “Besides, I couldn’t call Allison or Chris anyway. They had no idea that I was gone.”

When Stella murmured the last sentence, the blue jeep was being moved backwards to get on the road. Stiles looked at Stella out the corner of his hazel eyes and focused back on the road again. “Why?” he questioned. “Where were you going?”

Before she answered him, Stella licked her lips and watched the trees fly away out of the window as they drove. “To the Cemetery” she murmured. She wasn’t loud but Stiles was able to hear her. He frowned, waiting for her to continue. “When you guys went under water and I followed you to that white room… When we touched the Nemeton, I saw a memory of mine.” She slightly shook her head. “I can’t be older than 5. We were still living in Beacon Hills, somewhere near Scott’s house, I think. One night… My mom came home drunk and I couldn’t even remember that. I knew it happened, but it was a total blank for me.” Stella took a deep breath, resting her head back on the seat, looking ahead through the wind shield. “And I started thinking, you know, after seeing that hallucination on Monday, the one about my mom…” Stella licked her lips, the jeep stopped on the red light. Stiles turned to look at her as she continued. “I thought about all of the things, all of the excuses I made to get away from her. Maybe I wanted to punish her for making me this angry, arrogant and… I don’t know, careless, emotionless person that I am today. There is a moment in my life that… I didn’t know anything aside from feeling angry or…” She didn’t say the other emotion but she continued. “And it was all her fault.” She gulped down, looking down at her hand as the light turned to green and Stiles kept driving, still listening carefully, not knowing what to say. “But now I see it’s for nothing.” She chuckled sarcastically as she looked at Stiles. “I mean, can you imagine? Kate Argent and regret… Woman burned down the whole house with innocent werewolves and humans in it, not thinking about it twice and I can bet hundred bucks that she’s not even feeling the R of the regret.” She shook her head. “It wasn’t the Kate Argent image in my head, you know? I admired her. She was my mom. And now…” She licked her lips again, not looking at Stiles. “I just wish I knew the reason why she did what she did.”

Maybe Kate didn’t feel any regret, but Stiles definitely did, not showing that to Stella. He knew no one told Stella that how her mother actually died, not yet. It was still a big secret between them because Allison wanted to keep it that way, being the one who witnessed it. Now, Stella was smart, she could easily have been figured out the truth to that already but Stiles wasn’t sure. So, for the rest of the trip, he stayed quiet. He didn’t say anything and thankfully, Stella didn’t try to open up a conversation topic either.

They drove in silent.

“Stella” said Stiles, finally ending the silence when the jeep was parked in front of the Argent’s apartment, the engine still running. Stella stopped as she heard Stiles with her hand on the handle and turned around to look at him. “Can I ask you something?” Stella, twisting her lips in curiosity and nodded for him to continue. Stiles took a deep breath in and parted his lips again before he continued. “What Deaton said back in the clinic… You didn’t say anything about it.” Stella nodded as he completed his question. “Why?”

“Because…” Stella gave out a breath from her nose and shrugged one shoulder. “What we did… We did that to save our families, right?” She breathed in, looking at Stiles. “It sounds terrible, knowing I can be stuck in a hallucination and believe me, nothing good ever happens in that world.” She softly smiled before continuing. “But, like I said, we did that to save our parents. Chris is like my father, Stiles. So… if I trap in my hallucinations in return of saving him… Then, so be it.”

“That’s not the only reason” Stiles murmured, looking at her with a worried expression on his face.

Stella breathed in and breathed out, trying to calm her anxiety inside her. This was an issue of hers that she wouldn’t usually talk about but after everything that’s been going on, she needed to get this out of her chest. “Yes, it’s not” she finally responded. She exhaled and turned to look at Stiles. “All my life, I’ve always been ‘The Other Argent’. Always one step behind. No one knew who my father was; he could be anyone. A hunter or even worse for the hunter families… a hunt. My mom was, uh… how can I say this?... she was one of the reckless ones out there, let’s say, so anything is possible, and no one expects the best from me. In the other hand, she…” Stiles, knowing what she was talking about softly nodded. Stella pressed her lips together, looking down at her hands and then back to Stiles. “I mean, don’t get me wrong. I love Allison so much. She is my best friend and the only person I can use the phrase ‘I love you’ to but after some time, your criminal record gets bigger, you get smaller and you stuck being the other Argent.”

“You want to prove yourself to the others” Stiles observed, still looking at Stella.

“Basically.” She opened the door and looked at Stiles with a threatening smile. “If I ever hear these from someone else, I’ll kill you in your sleep.” Stiles softly chuckled, nodding in the way of saying no problem. She hopped off from the jeep and she closed the door but looked at him through the open window. “Thanks for the ride. See you tomorrow.”

“See you” Stiles murmured, watching her get inside the apartment and then he sighed, getting all the information in and then drove away.

The other morning, Stiles picked her up from her apartment and they drove to Mr. Tate’s house. Sheriff was going in from the front door and stall him while Stiles, Scott and Stella were going in from the back. They stepped over a rat trap and reached the door. Stiles grabbed the handle and pushed it to open it, the door started to creak. He stopped, Stella and Scott grimaced. He tried to open it slowly, but something happened, the creaking filled up the room. After few tryouts, Stiles opened the door fast and as they all got in, he closed it back with the same speed.

Stella, Scott and Stiles looked around, searched in the room that was obviously belonged to Malia, at least it used to be. They looked in the drawers, at the toys and handed them over to Scott for him to catch a scent. Stella gave him plushy panda as Stiles gave him a bear. Scott took them, bringing them up to his nose but didn’t get anything.

He opened his hands to both sides, looking at Stiles and Stella. “All I’m getting is some animal smell” Scott announced.

“What kind of animal?” Stiles asked curiously, walking over to the dresser Scott was standing right next to and grabbed a horse toy to give it to Scott but then he heard the growl like Stella and Scott who were just standing still and looking at the doorstep where a dog was standing and looking at them.

“Dog” Scott said, not moving. Stiles quickly turned to look at the animal and tried to hide the toy inside his jacket as he looked at the rottweiler. Stella gulped, not knowing what to do, meanwhile Stiles quietly cleared his throat.

“Hi, puppy” he said, trying to be cute and calm and then as he changed the tone in his voice and looked at Scott from the corner of his eyes, then quickly looked back at the door. “Get rid of it.”

“Me?” Scott asked, hating being the werewolf in this trio.

Stella tried not to roll her eyes. “Yes, you, genius” she murmured, heatedly. “Glow your freaking eyes at it, something, be the alpha.”

The dog kept snarling and growling at them. “I can’t” Scott said between his teeth, trying not do something that the dog wasn’t going to like. “I don’t have the control.”

Stella sighed. She didn’t normally had problems with dogs. God, she loved dogs but she had some problems with the dogs that could bark and let the owner know there were people in the house that weren’t supposed to be there, so the only solution to that was their dog, meaning, their alpha werewolf Scott…

“Okay, buddy, you’re going to have to try something” Stiles said as the dog growled again.

Scott sighed and used his body language to tell the dog to calm down, starting to walk towards it with slow steps. “Nice doggy” Scott said, making Stella to question if he was serious as she looked at Stiles and roll her eyes. Because it didn’t work. The dog started barking and Scott quickly jumped back. The dog wasn’t attacking them, only barking which was comforting but also scary. 

“Apollo!” Someone yelled from the inside. It was probably Mr. Tate. His voice sounded angry and like he was done with everything which was understandable. “Apollo, shut up! Shut the hell up!” The dog immediately stopped barking and few seconds later he left them alone in the room, running away. Stella dropped her shoulders; Stiles shook his head saying ‘Not even gonna bother’ and then turned around to keep handing stuff to Scott.

“Here. Try that” Stiles said, handing him the notebook. Scott didn’t even bother to sniff as Stiles was still looking at the bookshelf. “Anything?”

Scott shook his head when Stiles turned to look at him. “All I’m getting is the dog” Scott said, hitting his other hand with the book. Stiles looked around in desperation, meanwhile Stella narrowed her eyes, looking at a frame next to bookshelf. She pointed the picture. “Look” she murmured. It was a picture of Malia and her sister.

Stiles silently took out his phone and took a picture of it.

Sheriff was standing right next to his police car, watching Stella, Scott and Stiles walk to himself. The expression on his face was showing the way how his little chat with Mr. Tate went: Total disaster apparently.

“I’m sorry” Scott said, shrugging his shoulders in defeat as they walked over to him and stopped in front of him. “I tried as hard as I could. If it wasn’t so long ago, I might have been able to do it.”

Sheriff pressed his lips together, nodding as he looked down on his feet and then lifted his head up to look back at them. “It’s okay. It was a long shot” he responded with an acrid expression. He thought of Mr. Tate’s face full of grief. He slowly shook his head to snap out of it and continued. “In fact, it was a pretty terrible idea. I think I just ripped a wound open in that poor man. I never should have brought you guys here. I don’t know what I was thinking. Thanks for trying, alright?” He softly patted on Scott’s shoulder and he got in his car, looking at his son. “See you at home.” Stiles waved him goodbye, while Sheriff looked at Stella. “Take care of yourself, Stella.” Stella sent him a small smile and a nod. Sheriff started his engine and drove away.

“Aren’t there a lot of cases that go unsolved?” Scott asked, opening arm to a side and walking across Stiles, looking at him.

“Yeah” Stiles answered, putting his hands in his pockets nervously. “I just think this is the one he felt like he could’ve figured out right now.”

“Why is it so important now?” Scott asked curiously.

“He wants to be able to solve one more while he’s still Sheriff” Stiles answered but he wasn’t looking at Scott, he was watching the road his dad drove away on. As he looked at him over his shoulder, Stella sighed. She knew what was happening but it was between the two of them, so, she decided to shut her mouth.

Scott looked at his best friend with a frowned look. “What do you mean ‘still Sheriff’?”

When Melissa stepped on the porch, she heard the arguments. “That doesn’t make any sense, Dad!” Scott yelled as she frowned and opened the door, walking inside her house and then closed the door behind her. “Who are you helping?” Melissa made her way to the living room where Scott and Rafael were arguing about something. “Just get out!”

“Scott” Rafael said. Melissa stopped walking as she reached the living room and saw father-son due arguing heatedly. She frowned a lot more, creating an anxious v between her eyebrows.

“What?” he yelled as an answer. He was furious and he could hear his heart pounding like crazy which was never a good sign in his life. “I can’t believe that you’d do this to my best friend!” he said, showing himself, strengthening his case.

Mr. McCall’s arms parted to both sides, trying to explain himself. “I’m not doing anything to your friend” he said. “I’m doing my job.”

“Your job sucks!” Scott said this time as a response. His voice was getting louder by the second as his level of anger rising inside him.

“Some days I can’t argue that.”

“Can somebody tell me what the hell is going on?” Melissa finally intervened curiously, her gaze moving between Scott and Rafael. 

Scott pointed his dad with his finger. “He’s trying to get Stiles’ dad fired!”

“No, that’s not true” Rafael defended himself but ever since Melissa heard what Scott said, she was looking at her ex-husband, accusing him. After all, she knew him.

“What are you doing?”

“Conducting a case for impeachment” Mr. McCall explained.

“That sounds a lot like getting him fired” Melissa said, raising her voice. Now she was angry.

“The lack of resolution and ability to close cases is what’s going to get him fired” Rafael corrected her in his own truth and way. Scott was looking at his dad with almost steam coming out of his ears. “My job is just to collect the information.” Rafael looked at his son whose breathing was getting irregular and heavily. “And it’s the job my superiors have given me.”

“Your job sucks!” Melissa yelled but then she noticed her son’s coming out claws. She knew she had to do something, and she had to do something quick before Rafael saw anything. “Scott, sweetheart.” Melissa took a step towards Scott and stood right in front of him. Rafael noticed the tone change in Melissa’s voice and looked at his son with a worried look on his face. Melissa softly grabbed Scott’s hands, full clawed out. “Calm down.” When Scott’s eyes started to glow bright red, thanks to Melissa, Rafael couldn’t see that. She was standing right in front of him, blocking Rafael’s vision. “Come with me right now.” Melissa dragged Scott away from Rafael to the beginning of the staircase, without saying anything to him and looked deeply into her son’s eyes. “Let it go. Just breathe and let it go.”

“I’m trying” Scott, groaning and breathing heavily. He felt his teeth turning to fangs. He tried to take a deep breath, listening to his mother but couldn’t do it. His heartbeats were getting faster. He was almost at his full werewolf form.

“You told me you and Stiles learned a way to control this” Melissa said, taking a deep breath. She looked at his son, worried, trying to find a way to control and calm him down. “You find an anchor, right?” Melissa looked at his glowing red eyes. “Find your anchor.”

“My anchor was Allison” Scott said, squeezing every muscle in his body not to shift and control. He didn’t want to think about Allison because that shit still hurt him. “I don’t have Allison anymore.”

“Then be your own anchor” Melissa said, sharp as a knife, looking at her son. “You can do this.” Scott leaned his head back, take few deep breathes and closed his eyes. His fangs went back in, his claws were no longer there. When he opened his eyes back, they were back to being brown. He was panting, his heart was beating fast. He breathed in, breathed out, controlling the shifting and as he sighed, looking at his mother. With his eyes, he messaged her that he got it. He was in control. Melissa sighed, put her hand on Scott’s shoulder supportively. “Sweetheart, let me tell you something no teenager ever believes, but I swear to you it’s the absolute truth.” She saw the pain in his glowing eyes when he mentioned Allison and it only brought up the motherhood inside her which was usually always there anyway. She was worried about her son. “You fall in love more than once.” Scott looked down with pain and brokenness in his eyes and took a deep breath, gave it back. His mother started to smile softly, sincerely. “It’ll happen again. And it’ll be just as amazing and as extraordinary as the first time. And maybe just as painful… But it will happen again, I promise.” Scott looked at his mother. “And until then, be your own anchor.”

Stiles was laying down on his bed when he heard a knock on his door and the door opened widely, showing him the visitor. As he saw Scott, he slowly straightened up and parted his lips. “Hey, what’s going on?” he asked, pointing the flashlight between Scott’s hands.

“You and me” Scott started, raising his eyebrows. “We’re going to go out and find a body.” Stiles frowned curiously, looking back and forth between Scott and the flashlight. “A dead body.”

Stella sighed as she stopped looking at outside, the dark sky through the window and looked at her reflection on the mirror. It was almost midnight, Allison and Lydia were passed out on Allison’s bed, studying. Chris was sleeping in his respective room. The only one who was up at the moment was Stella who was also supposed be in Allison’s room with the girls but as in now, she was putting on her hoodie and hat and stealing Chris’ flashlight. She grabbed her Chinese daggers from the top drawer in her room, put them in her pockets. She took her 0.45 and placed it between her skin and belt. 

When everything was settled, she took a deep breath and looked at the car keys she stole from Allison’s room and put them in her hoodie’s pockets alongside with her hands. She quietly made her way to the elevator and then to garage and she got in the car.

She’s been doing that a lot lately. Ever since their battle with the Darach, she’s been having some problems, some relapsing on the Argent department where she didn’t feel like she was one. Because of that, she was spending her time running away from them, trying to escape them. It was one of the reasons why she moved back to her room after living with Allison in her room for over a week.

Stella thought spending some time with the person she loves, with Allison, would make that feeling go away but in contrary, it made it worse, made those feelings more obvious and harder to run away from each day. From that moment, she started to run away from her without actually Allison noticing that. Of course, there were times she missed her like crazy, but Stella was that person. It scared the crap out of her, even the thought of sharing her inner battle with someone.

She hated herself enough for the things she talked with Aiden without even she could control herself anyway. This needed to stop.

Stella sighed, brushed her hair back and started the engine with the plan in her mind. She moved up and down her eyebrows as she drove out the garage. “Well, there goes nothing” she murmured as she made her way to the woods. She was hoping to find the girl sheriff was talking about today. She needed to get her thoughts into one place, she needed to be busy like looking for someone in the woods.

That was exactly what Stella needed.

Stela parked her car, climbed out. She checked her gun and the daggers and then hit the on button on the flashlight and started walking in the woods. She thought she was alone, but she was wrong. As she heard some familiar voices, she stopped by reflex and listened, looking around.

“You know, if my dad’s right, that means there’s another werewolf in town that we haven’t met yet” someone said. Stella frowned, knowing it was Stiles. She took few steps toward the voice, but according the volume of the voice, they were already walking towards her.

“I know” Scott replied, showing Stella who Stiles was with.

“If it turns out to be something like triplets that from into, like, a three-headed hound of hell, I’m seriously not up for that” Stiles continued as they were walking, looking at the phone Scott was holding.

“Yeah, me either.” Scott lifted his head up and looked ahead, sighed. “Especially if I can’t even control my own transformation anymore” Scott added, looking down at his phone and walking into a point where they were now invisible to Stella who was also walking towards those two guys who looked very focused.

“What the hell are you guys doing here?” Hearing Stella’s loud and sudden voice, Stiles started holding onto Scott’s shoulder and causing him to drop his phone from height and into a water puddle. Stella rolled her eyes, while Scott was asking if he was serious with his brown eyes to Stiles who turned to look at him.

“Sorry, buddy” Stiles said as Stella leaned down and grabbed Scott’s phone from the puddle, shaking it, trying to get it dry.

Scott shook his head to Stiles and then walked down towards Stella. “What are you doing here?” he asked, Stella handed him his phone. As Scott wiped the water off it with his hand, Stella tilted her head.

“I thought fresh air would do wonders at this time of the day, McCall” she said and first one to notice the sarcasm was Stiles which probably was because he was also using it a lot.

“You’re here to look for the body too, aren’t you?” he asked, getting his balance back that he lost when he was walking down to hill towards Stella.

Stella formed a smile on her face. “Bingo, Stilinski” she mouthed with a soft whisper.

Stiles rolled his eyes at Stella’s attitude. “Why don’t you try to be a little bit easygoing and collaborative, ha? Just a little!” Stella gave out a sharp breath from her nose. Right she was about to answer him back, Scott felt the need to get in between them knowing their capacity to argue with each other more.

“It still works” he announced, shaking his phone in the air. Stiles dropped his shoulders, giving out a breath, he knew why Scott shut them up so as he was about to look at him and continue doing whatever the hell they were trying to do.

But he stopped moving when he noticed something ahead. “Let me see the flashlight” he said and not even giving a chance for Scott to say something, he grabbed it from his hands and started walking away from them. Stella and Scott exchanged a quick look and then, using Stella’s flashlight as their own light source, they followed Stiles. When they stood next to Stiles, they saw the wrecked car that was upside down, obviously being the one which was in the accident. Stella let out a soft ‘huh’ between her lips. “I think we found it.”

“Uh, why wouldn’t they move it?” Scott murmured, walking behind Stella and then stopping right next to her. “Isn’t that evidence?”

“Probably too much of a pain in the ass to tow out” Stella answered him with a murmur as her eyes were moving around on the car alongside her flashlight, trying to see if there was something else inside or around it. “You know how lazy and sloppy people can be.”

“Look at this” Stiles said, getting closer to the car with the flashlight in his hands. Stella put her flashlight on the door as a spotlight and walked right to Stiles, seeing what Stiles was showing them. Claw marks on the car… “See those?” Stiles pointed the marks on the door. “Animal claws would be closer together, right?” His gaze moved up to them. “A lot closer?”

Scott imitated the claw marks as he put his hands on it, seeing if it fit. “Then it was a werewolf” he murmured but Stella had something else in her mind.”

“So, my dad was right” Stiles said.

Stella turned her whole body to look at them but flashlight was still pointing the car. “What if… What if it was actually a coyote?” Stella questioned, causing the boys to look at her with their eyebrows raised up with curiosity and confusion on their faces. “I mean… I know there are creatures called were-coyotes, or, I don’t know, coyote man. I’ve read in the bestiary.”

Stiles softly shook his head. “Bestiary?” he repeated. “That thing is pointless. All written in Latin and no one knows Latin.” Stiles huffed but Stella’s eyes moved between Scott and Stiles nervously as Stiles added between his breathes. “Except for Lydia which still surprises me to be honest.”

“I know Latin” Stella said, causing Stiles and Scott to stop and look at the young Argent.

“Wait, you know Latin?” Scott repeated, in shock as much as Stiles. It wasn’t actually that big of a deal or even a surprise. They already knew the fact that Lydia knew Latin but Scott and Stiles knew Lydia since third grade and they knew how smart she actually was from the beginning, but Stella…? She was still like a mystery to them that they were trying to solve but she wasn’t letting them to.

All they actually knew was how smart and genius she was so considering that… they shouldn’t have been that shocked.

Stella rolled her eyes, shook her head softly and parted her lips. “Yes, I know Latin” she repeated herself. “My grandfather thought me right after he thought me French.” She quickly crossed her arms in front of her chest and continued heatedly. “Look, this is not the point, like, at all.” She looked at Scott and Stiles. “The point is that sheriff’s first guess was coyotes taking the bodies away. I mean… werewolves and were-coyotes are pretty much like the same. It’s a possibility.”

Scott and Stiles looked at each other for a while, knowing she could be right and they shouldn’t be just going with the werewolf theory.

Stiles’ hand moved, making the flashlight the brighten inside the car, the backseat. He frowned as he noticed something and kneeled down next to it. “What is that?” Scott and Stella looked at Stiles who was reaching for something inside the backseat. He pulled the thing out, revealing Scott and Stella that it actually was a baby doll. Stiles stood up with it between his hands. As he was checking it out, he accidently pressed her belly, making it to talk and say ‘I’m hungry’ with its scary and sudden electronic voice.

They all jumped back, startled in fear. Stiles dropped the baby onto the ground, Stella closed her eyes as she put her hand on her heart. “I think I just had a minor heart attack” Stiles told them sitting on a rock, trying to calm himself down. Stella being the first one to come to herself and calm herself down, she suddenly found herself giggling at Stiles, covering her mouth with her hand. Stiles was giving her the death stare and then Stella stopped laughing but not because of Stiles.

As they heard a growling in the distance, they stopped fooling around and looked at the trees.

First one to notice the blue eyes in the dark was Stella. She gulped, not moving. “Hey, um, I am totally losing it here so…” Stella licked her lips anxiously. “So, uh, please tell me you’re seeing this.” She didn’t want to deal with banshee crap and hallucination shit. She was tired and she was glad to see Scott was nodding, confirming her.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m seeing it” Stiles said, getting closer to his friends. One of them was an alpha werewolf, the other one was a hunter. Since he was just a human, he thought standing close to them could be on his benefit.

Meanwhile the blue eyes disappeared and without losing any time, Scott run after it leaving Stiles and Stella behind. “Wait, hey, Scott!” Stiles screamed after him, but it was too late. “Scott, wait!”


	14. MORE BAD THAN GOOD

“Oh, my God, Scott!” Stella’s sudden and startled scream rose through the woods when her and Stiles bumped nose to nose with Scott. After finding a spot that they thought it was the coyote’s den, they went out to woods to look for the alpha who ran after the blue eyes. Stella thought it was for nothing since he was a werewolf and the woods that they were in was pretty big, but they needed to find Scott.

That’s when they found him but since Scott was running and came out of nowhere, Stella jumped on her spot with her eyes closed and her hand on her heart; Stiles screamed and jumped back. Scott also startled, closing his eyes.

It was the second time today that they all had a minor heart attack.

Scott was the first one to get to himself. “It was her” he announced through his breathes. “It was Malia.”

Stella’s hand dropped, raising her eyebrows. “Are you sure?” she asked curiously, knowing what it meant. Her heart was still pounding like crazy, but she tried to focus on the problem that they had at the moment.

“Yes, she ran way after I called her name, but her eyes were glowing.” Scott breathed out with the same speed; his heart was still pounding. “You were right Stella. She wasn’t a werewolf. She was a were-coyote.” Stella and Stiles shared a quick look and then their eyes found Scott. “I tried calling Derek, but he didn’t answer.”

As Stella frowned, thinking about the sour Hale werewolf, Stiles quickly parted his lips and looked at his best friend. “Yeah, I think we found something too” he said in a rush. Scott nodded and followed Stiles and Stella to the place they’ve found, Stiles holding the flashlight.

“You said, Derek didn’t answer your call, right?” Stella whispered to Scott with worry as they were following Stiles behind him. As she saw Scott shaking his head confirming her, Stella pressed her lips together making them a straight line of worry. “I’m not really comfortable with this. He wouldn’t do that if something weren’t wrong, you know that.”

Scott nodded again. “Yeah, I know.”

They quickly went down, showing Scott the thing that they’ve found. “It’s a coyote den” Stiles announced, before looking at Scott and Stella who were still behind him.

“Were-coyote” Scott murmured. Stella took a deep breath and gave it out as she went after Stiles, she was looking around trying to see if there was something that she’s missed before.

Stiles kneeled down and grabbed the blue jacket off the ground, showed it to Scott. “You see this? This is Malia’s” he said as he watched Scott kneel next to him. Stella was still standing, looking around, her arms crossed in front of her chest. “Remember, it’s the same one she was wearing in the photo.” Stiles took a deep breath while Scott’s brown eyes started to move around.

He reached out for a teddy bear, sighing. “We shouldn’t be here” Scott murmured, turning his head to look at the teddy bear in his hands.

“What do you mean?” Stiles questioned, looking at his friend. Stella took another breath, she knew they shouldn’t be here because now, their scent was all over the place. The were-coyote or Malia wasn’t going to come back here ever again. 

“She’s not going to come back now” Scott explained. “We just invaded her home.” He turned his head to look at Stella and Stiles. “Our scent’s going to be everywhere.”

“If she’s not going to come back here, where’s she going to go?” Stiles asked curiously.

Stella feeling overwhelmed by everything and using the sarcasm once again, rolled her eyes and looked at Stiles. “Unfortunately, Argent tech doesn’t produce any kind of coyote GPS just yet but if it ever happens, you’d be the first one to know” she said, causing Stiles to roll his eyes. But Stella didn’t care about that as she turned to look at Scott. “What about you? Can you track her now? You think you got her scent?”

Scott sniffed around on his spot without moving. “Maybe” he said with a low voice. “But I’m better at this when I’m a full wolf. And I’m still worried that if I do it, I won’t be able to turn back.”

Stella sighed, slightly nodding meanwhile Stiles’ soft voice was heard in the den. “The door’s still open” he murmured.

“If I can’t get to Derek, we’re gonna have to find someone else to help” Scott said, trying to change the subject.

As Stella was nodding, she was still looking around but then stopped. She raised one eyebrow with the thing she noticed and looked at the two boys in front of her. “Hey, this is basically a crime scene, right?” she asked, tilting her head. She was leaning against the rock behind her. Scott softly nodded. “I mean, I’m not a big fan of crime scenes, basically because I was usually the reason of them back in New York, but I, uh, I think it might be a little out of Deaton’s league, right?”

Stiles softly nodded and whispered. “And more in my dad’s.”

As they were waiting for Sheriff outside, Stella was digging the ground with her shoes. Indistinct conversation could be heard over the police radio. Stella looked up as she took a deep breath and saw Sheriff walking towards them with Malia’s blue jacket in his hands. “You sure it was her?” he asked curiously when he stood right in front of them

“I looked her right in the eyes” Scott answered the sheriff. “And they glowed… just like mine.”

“It makes sense, dad” Stiles insisted, looking at his father. His hands were moving up in the air as he was talking but Stella was thinking about how everything didn’t make sense. She had one question in her mind. How could she be stuck in a coyote body?

“But it wasn’t a girl” sheriff said, looked at his son and Scott. Stella was looking around, at the cops, feeling nervous. She moved on her spot, coughed softly to clear her throat and wrapped her arms around herself, looked at the others. Definitely some memories of the NYPD were coming to her mind, but she tried to stay present. “It was a four-legged coyote, right?”

“Well, okay… But yeah, see, that’s the point that we don’t exactly have figured out yet” Stiles answered. Seeing him in trouble, Stella sighed and parted her lips to explain everything they know to the sheriff.

“Okay, but if it was a full moon…” Stella interrupted, trying to save Stiles. Honestly, she didn’t plan what to say exactly but they had a theory and she thought she would’ve made up as she went. She thought she had to share her own opinions and start talking to ignore the cops which were bringing crazy New York nights to her mind which she definitely did not want. “… and if she did change while her mom was driving, then anything could’ve happened.”

“Horrible things could’ve happened” Stiles emphasized their case. His hands were moving around in the air, joining the conversation as he was talking. “Ripping, shredding, tearing things.”

Stella continued. “Which is probably what caused the accident” she added.

“Think about it, Dad, alright?” Stiles said, he was really focused on his father. “They’re driving, Malia starts to change, she goes out of control, the mom crashed, and everybody dies.”

This time Scott looked at the sheriff quickly and continued. “Except for Malia” he added, explaining their theory.

“She blames herself, alright, goes off running into the woods and eventually becomes trapped inside the body of a coyote” Stiles said, finishing up the theory time to his father who was listening to them very carefully.

“That makes sense” Sheriff said, causing Scott and Stiles to sigh in relief but Stella murmured ‘wait for it’ under her breath without anyone hearing it. Something in his voice showed how much he believed them and that was closer to nothing. Meanwhile, sheriff continued with a louder voice. “In a Chinese folktale!” Stella pressed her lips, shaking her head to show that was what she was expecting but Scott and Stiles seemed to be frozen with the sheriff’s reaction. “Look, this is… this insane.” He stopped and after shaking his head, he pointed Stella, Scott and Stiles and continued. “I need this kept quiet. The three of you, not a word. I don’t want anyone hearing about this. I especially don’t want Mr. Tate hearing about this.” They all nodded but Stella frowned as she heard a noise coming to her from behind. She turned to look back to see a 9-year-old girl with a blue jacket laying down on a rock and absolute fear in her eyes, causing her to gulp and not being able to breath. Then her eyes found the wolf, its fangs near the little girl’s throat as it was growling. As she gasped in fear, trying to take breathes in and out, she could hear someone calling her name from a distance. “Stella? Stella!”

She snapped out of it with the sheriff’s voice, she turned to look at him with empty eyes, trying to catch what was happening. She blinked few times and went back to normal. “Sorry” she murmured, looking at the stone. She saw nothing, there was nothing. So, with an exhale between her lips, she turned around and her eyes found the Sheriff. “What did you say?” Sheriff was looking at the young girl with a worried look but when another car pulled up right next to his, he sighed in frustration as he rolled his eyes.

“Oh, hell” he murmured, making Stella to frown and look at the car and its owner who was walking towards them with Mr. Tate right next to him. Scott’s father Rafael McCall aka Agent McCall aka Stella’s least favorite person… “Mr. Tate.” Sheriff greeted him with a head nod.

Mr. Tate grabbed the object in sheriff’s hand. “It’s hers” he said, holding the blue jacket as he was looking at it with sad eyes. He brought the jacket up to his nose, trying to sniff his long-lost daughter.

As Stella put her hands in her pockets and moved on her spot nervously, looking around, Agent McCall parted his lips, looked at the three teenagers across him. “Alright, wait here” he said.

Scott took a step forward, wanting to stop his dad. “Dad-”

Agent turned midway to look at his son. “I’ll talk to you in a minute. I wouldn’t mind hearing how your mom’s okay with you running around in the woods this late” he said, trying to be a dad now.

Stella understood Scott not wanting to talk to his dad so before Agent McCall walked away, she stepped forward, getting the attention on herself. “Actually…” Rafael stopped on his spot and straightened up as he looked at the young Argent. “Scott needs to drive me home. So, you are not gonna be able to have that ‘important’ talk. At least not right now.”

Agent McCall softly scoffed as he nodded and looked down at Stella. He was well aware of her criminal record and there she was, being defiant once again to an FBI agent. “I saw your car on our way here, Ms. Argent, I think you are capable of driving yourselves home.”

Scott and Stiles’ eyes were moving up and down between Stella and Rafael. Stella wrinkled up her lips and shrugged. “Broke down” Stella lied, not breaking at all. “That’s why it’s in the middle of the woods.”

Agent kept his eyes on the brunette. “You know, one of the reasons why I came here in the first place was because I’ve seen your record, Ms. Argent” Rafael started, straightening up his shoulder as he was looking down at Stella but it didn’t bother her at all. She just kept listening as she raised her eyebrows. “The charges were either dropped or burnt to ashes in an office fire.” Stella raised her eyebrows more, questioning the point to all these. “Second-degree robbery, first-degree robbery, arsonism, breaking and entry… And many more illegal things… You are highly wrong if you are thinking I’m letting it slide.”

Stella laughed with sarcasm. “So, you’ve come here to destroy people’s lives, three in particular?” She asked, mockingly. “Scott’s, mine and the sheriff’s… Is that what it is?” She shook her head to both sides, not cracking her smile. “I thought FBI had better things to do, like, I don’t know, save people’s lives rather than destroy them?”

Scott and Stiles were looking at each other and back to Stella and Rafael as the Sheriff was questioning her sanity and reasons to what she was currently doing.

Rafael smiled the way Stella was smiling and looked her in the eyes. “You can only get away with so much, Ms. Argent” Agent McCall said, pretty confidently. “There’s going to be a slip eventually and I will catch it.” 

“Then I hope you plan on staying in Beacon Hills for a very long time, Agent McCall” she said, she was confident about herself, too. Mr. McCall nodded them goodbye and with Mr. Tate, he left them alone. The second he started walking away, everyone started staring at her. She frowned, opening her hands to sides and shrugged. “What?”

“I honestly don’t know what to say to you right now” Scott said, he was speechless about what happened few seconds ago.

Sheriff quickly turned to look at her. “Well, I do” he said heatedly. He waved his hand, scolding Stella. “Are you out of your mind? That’s an FBI agent right there.”

Stella rolled her eyes and sighed as she shrugged. “Well, he was driving me crazy” she said, making the sheriff to sigh in disbelief and raise his eyebrows.

Stella shrugged again, not caring.

“Thank you.” She raised her brows and turned her head left to look at Scott, hearing his voice. After the stupid bravery she did for him, he felt the need to walk her to her car. Not that she needed it, but he wanted to thank her. “What you did back there… It was incredibly stupid and so brave.”

Stella laughed. “Pretty much sums all my plans up, right?” she murmured and then added a smile and pushed him softly with her shoulder. “I know one thing or two about family dramas, Wolfy.” She shrugged. “It’s okay, really.” She laughed again as they kept walking. “Besides, I saved you this time. He is still gonna be a pain in your ass.” Scott laughed in gratitude. As he was looking at Stella, he thought about a memory. It was his first dinner with Allison and the Argents, the day he met Stella.

“Can I ask you something?” Scott asked with curiosity in his voice. Stella took out her car keys and turned to look at Scott. She opened the door and nodded yes at Scott. “The day I first met you… What you and your mother were fighting about?”

Stella let the memory fly into her mind as she kept looking at Scott.

_**** Stella managed to reach to the front door in the heavy and fast rain. She plucked the fit key to the lock and turned it over as she sighed and pushed the door open with a little force. She walked in and closed the door behind her. She took out her wet coat in frustration, breathed in. She pressed her lips together and hung her coat quickly._

_“I’m home!” she yelled out, throwing her bag onto the ground._

_“We’re in here!” She heard her mom yelling her back from the dining room. She sighed, remembering their current argument, which was still in motion and this time, Stella was determined to go all the way._

_She deserved to know the truth._

_“Who’s that?” Scott murmured asking as he leaned to Allison. He was just meeting the members of the Argent family and he had no idea who the girl he heard was._

_As Stella walked to the dining room, Allison turned to Scott. “My cousin, Stella” she answered. Meanwhile, Stella was standing in the doorway. The first thing Scott noticed was her wet soaked clothes and her water dripping down form her long brown hair. With their brown eyes, she and Allison were almost look alike._

_“She’s my daughter” Kate said, hearing Scott’s question. Scott seemed to be surprised about it. He never thought she had a daughter or Kate Argent was even a mother. Besides, he didn’t see the ‘father around’ but he understood enough to not talk about it. It was a hell-to-the-no kind of subject._

_So was his father._

_“Sorry, I’m late” she said, pulling her wet hair and letting them go on her right shoulder. Everyone was in the table, sitting with food on their plates but there was something different with the scenario. Right next to her cousin Allison, there was a boy sitting with his long fluffy brown hair and brown eyes and blue t-shirt. Stella assumed it was the Scott that Allison told her about. “The rain outside got really worse. But I got what you wanted. Let’s hope that it’s not ruined.”_

_“It’s okay, darling” Victoria said, looking at her with a light smile on her voice while Scott raised his eyebrows and looked at Kate._

_“You have a daughter?” His astonishment could be seen in his words and his eyes._

_Stella walked up to her chair, held the wood and rolled her eyes as she looked at Scott. “Don’t get her started” she said, taking off the scarf on her neck. She was still standing behind her chair and she wasn’t intended to sit until she changed out of wet clothes. But right now, she wanted to meet Scott, so, she was postponing that. “She loves it when people ask that.”_

_“What can I say?” Kate started, swinging her fork in the air with a smile. She shrugged, making Stella roll her eyes under her sleeves. “I’m a proud-”_

_“Kate” Chris said, shutting her up with a voice that was sharp as a knife. Stella softly chuckled, understanding why the tension was so sensible at the moment. According to her uncle’s expression, he definitely didn’t want Scott on this table. It was more highly that Kate invited him over._

_“Anyway” Stella said, turning her head to look at the unwanted guest. “You must be Scott.”_

_“And you are Stella” Scott said, holding Stella’s hand and shaking._

_Stella softly laughed. “Actually, right now, I’m wet” she said, making Allison laugh with her. Stella slowly hit the chair she was holding and took a deep breath. “I’m gonna go upstairs and change. You go ahead, start without me.”_

_“Stella-”_

_Stella stopped, hearing Kate’s voice behind her and turned around to look at her mother and started talking with a firm expression, interrupting her. “I’ll be right back, mom” she said and quickly went upstairs to her room. ****_

“I don’t even remember” Stella said, softly chuckling and looking at Scott. She shrugged with Scott’s all attention on her. “We argued a lot. She would usually boss me around, hide something from me, which drove me insane. Naturally.” She moved her eyebrows up and down. “There have been times I used even a smoke grenade to escape from the argument.”

They lightly laughed. Scott looked at Stella with a smile. “Yeah, Allison used that tactic the day of the lunar eclipse, escaping my dad” he said, making Stella to laugh and pulled the door to herself, opening it.

“Well, I’m glad it helped someone else” she said and got inside her car. She rolled down the window and looked at Scott. “See you tomorrow, Scott.”

As Stella drove away, Scott sighed looking the way car disappeared.

“Here’s where we found the den” Stella informed her cousin, showing her the spot on the map from her phone, standing right next to her and looking over her shoulder. Since she came home late and they came to school in separate cars the morning, she didn’t have time to tell her what happened last night. Now they were all in school and there wouldn’t have been better time for them to talk. “It’s right in the middle of the hiking trails.”

“Well, that could narrow it down” Allison said, she was frowning as she was looking at the spot Stella was pointing at. “Coyotes travel in fixed trails. But I think you’re right about her not going back to the den.”

Scott frowned in confusion as he looked at Allison, but Stella was the one who explained her. “Coyotes don’t like wolves, Wolfy” she said with a light smile. “And they’re pretty smart.”

Allison nodded, confirming her cousin. This was the longest period of time that they’ve spent together in a very long time. She knew something was bothering Stella, and to be honest, she knew about it ever since Mr. Blake tied her and Lydia up. She didn’t know what the problem was but whenever she tried to talk to her and find out what was wrong, Stella always changed the subject and told her that she was fine and then she was back to being her usual self which was a closed, sealed box. Allison was worried but with Stella, she could only talk to her if she let her talk to her. And right now, Stella was just too far away from talking to anyone.

“Yeah, if they don’t want to be heard, they actually walk on their toes” Allison continued. Stiles was pretty surprised with this new information, fun fact about the coyotes.

He quickly turned his head to look at her with his eyebrows raised up. “Coyotes tip-toe?”

“They tip-toe” Allison repeated, rolling her eyes at Stiles. Stiles mouthed a silent ‘why not?’ as he looked at Scott, meanwhile the school bell echoed in the school telling them the recess was over. “I got to go but send me the pinned location.”

“Okay” Stella responded with a slight head nod after Allison who was running her way out of the class.

After she was gone, right when Stella and Stiles sat on their seats, Kira stepped in front of Scott and stopped him. They started talking while Kira was looking through her bag, trying to find something. But then Mr. Yukimura walked up to his daughter with a huge pile of paper in his hands. Meanwhile as they continued their own conversation, Stiles turned his whole body and looked at Stella, leaned towards her. “Hey” he said to get Stella’s attention. “Scott told me you were using Allison’s car last night. The mechanic didn’t call yet? Do you know what the problem is with your car?”

Stella pressed her lips together, gave out a sharp breath out of her nose and then looked at Stiles. She was clearly very frustrated about this. “No, I’ve talked to the mechanic and I, uh…” She softly shook her head to both sides. “I think I’m gonna need a new car.” Stiles stretched his lips to form an ‘ops’ expression, but before he could say anything, Mr. Yukimura’s voice was heard, causinf everyone to focus on him and turn back to the board.

“Alright, everyone” he said. “Let’s get started.” Stella loved the energy from that guy. History was already one of her favorite classes, but now… She was pretty happy that Mr. Yukimura wasn’t there when Ms. Blake was running around in the hallways, kissing Derek and killing teachers. “We were just talking about internment camps and prisoners of war. There’s a passage in our reading that I’d like to go over in more detail.” He walked to his desk. “Who would like to come up and read out loud for us?” He put the book on the stand and his eyes moved from Stella to Stiles who was sitting right next to her. Stella gave out a breath anxiously, knowing Stiles’ condition. “Mr. Stilinski, how about you?”

Stiles lifted his head up to look at Mr. Yukimura. “Oh, maybe someone else could” he reacted with anxiety rising inside him. He was moving his pen between his fingers.

Stella quickly added. “And maybe that someone else could be me?” she suggested, leaning more onto her desk as she put her elbows on the top of it. 

“Everyone participates in my class, Mr. Stilinski” their history teacher said as he was looking at Stiles, and then his eyes found Stella. “And Ms. Argent, I appreciate your enthusiasm to participate but this passage belongs to Mr. Stilinski.”

Stella sighed and leaned back as she was looking at Stiles who slowly stood up and nodded. “Okay” he murmured as he was walking up to the stand. Stella could see his hands shaking, she was on alert in case anything bad could happen. Because right now Scott was reading the research Kira did for them- well, actually it was for Scott- and there could be something important they could use.

In the other hand, protecting Stiles was the only thing Stella could think about.

Stiles stood behind the stand and immediately grabbed the sides. He looked at the passage in front of him and all of a sudden, all the letters started to fly around on the book, got blurred and slide away. He squeezed his hands, shut his eyes. Stella could see something was definitely off. She closed down her book. When Stiles lifted his head up, Stella quickly got up. The anxiety and the panic were rising inside of Stiles every second and Stella didn’t even need to ask if he was okay because she knew he wasn’t. Scott was looking at them in worry, but he also knew what Stella was thinking as she reached to Stiles.

Stella grabbed Stiles and quickly turned to Mr. Yukimura. “I should take him to the nurse’s office” she said, trying to remain calm. Mr. Yukimura quickly nodded, and Stella put his arm around her shoulder and without getting crushed by his weight, she got him out of the class.

She took him to the locker room that she knew it was empty this time around.

As soon as they stepped inside, Stiles quickly freed himself from Stella. He was walking without a balance; he was breathing heavily and shakily. “Stiles, look at me” Stella said, following him with fast steps. She was trying to get his attention; she was trying to get him to focus and whatever she needed to do to stop this panic state he was in. “Stiles.” Stiles walked up to the sink ahead of him. “Stiles, is this a panic attack?”

Stiles grabbed the sink and looked at his reflection on the mirror. “It’s a dream” he said to himself. He was dreaming and he needed to wake up. “It’s a dream. This is just a dream.”

In that moment, Stella realized she knew what was happening. Yes, he was having a panic attack, but it wasn’t because of his normal anxiety. It was a state of panic because he couldn’t read the passage, he thought he was dreaming and that he couldn’t wake up. He was having a panic attack and he wasn’t gonna be able to get out of it until he knew it wasn’t a dream and it was real.

“No, it’s not” Stella said with a confident voice, very sharp, very certain. “This is real. You’re here. You’re here with me.” Stella stopped, licking her lips. She had an idea. “Okay, okay. What do you do? I mean, like, how do you tell if you’re awake or dreaming?” Stella normally knew the answer to that but right now she needed to force Stiles to think. She was trying to clear the panic cloud in his mind by focusing him on one thing.

“Your fingers… You count your fingers” Stiles answered between his panic-full and heavy breathings. He felt like his chest was going to explode because right now it was really hard for him to breath. “You have extra fingers in dreams.”

“How many do I have?” Stella asked, putting both of her hands in the air wide open, showing them to Stiles. “Hey! Look at me. Come on, Stiles. Look at my hands and count with me.” Stiles was still holding onto the sink, but he turned his whole body to look at Stella. Young Argent kept her hands in the air, closed them except one finger and continued. “One.” She showed another one.

Stiles looked at Stella, trying to focus. “Two.” Stella opened another one, seeing Stiles in panic. He was still breathing heavily, and he didn’t look like he was getting any better. She tried to hide her own anxiety as she was trying to help him out.

“Keep going.”

Stiles took another deep breath, gave it out. “Three.” Stella opened another finger up. “Four.”

Her thumb opened to the side. “Five.”

Moved onto her right hand. “Six” Stiles said, his breathings started to get slower. Stella showed him another finger. “Seven.”

She did another one. “Eight” she said, trying to support him. Her index finger moved away from her palm.

“Nine” Stiles said, a little louder this time. He was holding onto the sink but now he looked a lot better than when they first got here. Stella opened up her last finger and now her hands were in the air, her palms were facing Stiles. “Ten.”

Stella showed her hands to Stiles once again who was a lot calmer now. “Ten” she said, breathing out. “Ten.” Stiles took a deep breath, realizing what was happening. He looked around, broken. His eyes were flickering with fear.

Stella took a step forward to him and kneeled in front of him as Stiles was panting and trying to breath properly now. He wrapped his arms around his legs, looking at Stella with worry and definitely fear in his hazel eyes. He gulped down. “What the hell is happening to me?” Stiles asked, scared and tired of what’s been happening for the last few weeks now.

“We’ll figure it out” Stella said, shaking her head. Her only purpose was to give Stiles confidence, trying to make him feel great. But to be honest, she wasn’t really sure if they could figure out but right now saying they could, seemed like the right thing to say. “You’re going to be okay.”

“Am I?” Stiles questioned. He didn’t believe or buy any of the things Stella told him and all these coming from Stella didn’t change anything or make things better either. He knew Scott was going to say these things because he was gonna think he had to and he was usually a hopeless optimist, but Stella? She’d always say what she was thinking. If there was no way out, boom, Stella would be the first one to give the bad news. She should’ve known that she was talking bullshit. Stiles looked at Stella. “Are you?” Stella gulped down, blinked and kept looking at him. “Stella, you could get trapped in your crazy hallucinations. Scott can’t transform. Allison’s being haunted by her dead aunt. And I’m straight up losing my mind.” Stella sighed, looking at Stiles. Not that she didn’t know any of the batshit craziness that he was talking about, but still… “We can’t do this. We can’t… We can’t help Malia. We can’t help anyone.”

Stella took a deep breath and sat on the ground, leaning against the wall. “Stiles” she said underneath her breath. She sighed and looked at her friend. “I’m not Scott. I don’t have an ability to see the best in worse and out of all of us, you know it the best.” She shrugged, looking at her hands for a second. “I know it all seems so dark and believe me, I do but…” She looked at Stiles. “I know one thing and that is… We can try. We can always try.”

Stiles lightly scoffed as he looked at Stella who was still sitting next to him on the floor. The history class was almost over, and they were still sitting down on the floor in the locker room. “I’ve noticed something” he said as he poked Stella with his shoulder. Remembering everything that happened few moments ago slowly, he had a soft smile on his face now as he was looking at one of his best friends. Stella raised her brows up in confusion, seeing the expression on his face as she started looking at him. “You didn’t call me by my last name.”

Stella couldn’t help her laughter as she noticed that and shook her head in disbelief, but she was still smiling. “Yeah, I guess I didn’t” Stella said, looking at Stiles and then softly shook her finger in the air to his face. “But don’t get used to it Stilinski.”

Stiles was definitely out of his panic state now. He was relieved, he was okay. He softly laughed and nodded, confirming her. “Now that’s my friend the other Argent.” Stella rolled her eyes and as they both laughed, Stella shoved him slowly, hitting his shoulder.

After leaving Stiles to safe hands of Scott, she decided to do something that’s been bothering her ever since that night and honestly, she couldn’t stop thinking about it the whole school day. She called a taxi over because Stiles gave her a ride this morning and her car was a total wreck still, and she told the driver to take her to Derek’s loft.

She knew Derek enough to know if there wasn’t something wrong, Derek would answer their calls. So, him not answering to Scott’s call, it actually worried Stella that something bad might have happened. That was why she was going to his loft, maybe she could be lucky enough to find something that could tell her where he was and what was happening.

Besides, Peter wasn’t answering their calls either so that was also weird.

Stella pulled the door to Derek’s loft, sliding it open a little bit faster than she intended to. The door opened, showing Stella the empty place that looked like no one’s been here for days, she took a deep breath. _Yes, something is definitely off here_ , she thought as she walked down the mini stairs and walked inside the room.

She kept walking until her feet stepped on something that bothered her. She frowned, took a step back to see what she stepped on. She kneeled down, seeing the silver bullet on the floor. She grabbed it, cleaning the dust on it with her thumb, revealing the carving on it. A skull… Stella frowned more like it was possible, creating a v between her eyebrows. “Araya Calavera?” she murmured in confusion.

This was a tradition between the hunter families that had roots. Not everyone had their own symbol but most of them did, usually the ones that had a system like the Argents and the Calaveras. They had these symbols carved on their bullets.

While it was a skull for the Calaveras’, Argents’ symbol was fleur-de-lis. 

Stella put the bullet in her pocket and as she was about to stand up, her phone started ringing. With her left hand, she reached out to her phone, seeing the caller ID which was Stilinski. Her thumb swiped side to answer the call and she got up, started walking towards the table as she brought the phone to her ear.

“Stella, where are you?” Stiles said without losing any time, the minute Stella picked up the call. Stella knew something was in the making the minute she heard Stiles. She walked over the table, looking around. She opened a drawer, found Derek’s keys to his jeep and swiped them to her pocket. Until she found Derek, she could use his black jeep. Besides, that sour wolf owed Stella.

“Derek’s loft” Stella murmured a lot calmer than Stiles. Her hand moved around on the table. She looked at the dust that stuck on her finger. She didn’t think Derek has been cleaning at all, so, this dust meant nothing. “I came here thinking that maybe I can find something.” She took a deep breath and looked around for one last time to see if she’s missed anything. 

“Did you?”

Stella made her way to the stairs, knowing the room upstairs. “Other than dust and the fact that Derek needs someone to do some cleaning here ASAP?” Stella asked, looking around in the upstairs as well. She sighed and headed to downstairs once again. “Not really.” She didn’t mention the bullet because Stella thought she had to find more before she told anyone about this. Besides, there was something that she couldn’t put her finger on, and there were more important things now that they should do. She could deal with sour wolf later on.

“Perfect” Stiles murmured, not liking this one bit. Stella could feel Stiles rolling his eyes even from here. But then Stiles kept talking louder without losing any more time. He started telling her what happened in the school. “The coyote in the woods came to school today and she wanted Kira to be her lunch, apparently. She was after the doll in my ba-”

Stella quickly interrupted him. “I told you to leave that doll in the car.”

“I know, alright, I know, but that’s not the point” Stiles quickly said and continued. “Mr. Tate was pretty furious and if we don’t do something to save Malia now, like, right now, he is going to kill her. I’m with Isaac and Scott, we are going to the clinic right now. We thought maybe Deaton could help us.”

Stella nodded, looked around once again and then she made her way to the door to get out of this place. “I’m on my way.”

“Xylazine” Deaton said, walking inside with three small bottles in his hand. He was wearing his white doctor smock, looking at the people around the metal table. Stiles, Stella, Scott and Isaac who were there to get help from him. Stella caught up with them right when they were getting out of their car outside the vet clinic. “It’s a tranquilizer for horses.” He put the bottles on the table and then lifted his head up to look at them. “For a were-coyote, expect it to work within seconds. I only have three. So, whoever’s shooting, needs to be a damn good shot.”

“Allison’s a perfect shot” Scott responded, lifting his head up to look at his boss. Stiles and Isaac who were actually thinking about Stella, looked at Scott in disbelief but Isaac was the one who talked against it.

“She used to be” he opposed, looking at Scott. He was leaning against the wall with his arms crossed in front of his chest as he continued, not believing that Allison was the one for this job. He thought Stella was. “Right now… our only chance is Stella.”

Stella crossed her arms in front of her chest like Isaac and despite knowing everything that Isaac talked and thought about, she decided to back Scott up and, obviously, her cousin. “Allison can do it” she murmured, looking at Isaac who was looking at Scott and Stella at the same time in disbelief.

“If we manage to find the thing and her hands stop shaking” he sarcastically agreed.

Stiles rolled his eyes and pointed the young man across him as he spoke. “Okay, what is the point of him?” Stella and Scott sighed, asking if he was starting with this again silently. Stiles continued. “Seriously, I mean, what is his purpose? Aside from the persistent negativity and the scarf? What’s up with the scarf anyway? It’s 65 degrees out.”

Isaac softly scoffed, moving her tongue on his lower lip and looking at Stiles. “Look, maybe I’m asking a question no one here wants to ask” he started, his eyes were moving on the people around him. “How do we turn a coyote back into a girl, when she hasn’t been a girl for eight years?”

Deaton focused his eyes on Scott who was looking down at his hands. He sighed, lifting his head up to see the people around him. “I can do it” he said, making Stella to raise her brows up as she was looking at Scott.

“You can?” she found herself asking.

Scott nodded, confirming her and turned to look at Stiles. “You remember the night that Peter trapped us in the school?” Stiles nodded yes; Scott continued. “In the gym, he was able to make me turn using just his voice. Deucalion did the same thing in the distillery.”

“This is a were-coyote, Scott” Deaton reminded, looking at the young man across him around the table. “Who knows if it’ll even work, even if you can find someone who can teach you.”

Stiles looked at Scott. “That’s why you called Derek, first” he said, now understanding the reason.

Scott sighed. “Yeah, I could try it on my own.” He softly shook his head and continued. “But right now, I’m too scared to even change into just a werewolf.”

“We need a real alpha” Stiles murmured, causing Scott to ask what he means with an expression on his face, looking at his friend. Stiles rolled his eyes and continued talking. “You know what I mean. An Alpha who can do alpha things…” His hands were moving up and down in the air, joining his case. Stella face palmed like she was praying God to stop him and walked over to Isaac. “You know, an alpha who can get it going… You know, get it-”

“Up?” Isaac completed Stiles’ sentence sarcastically. Scott sighed, Stiles nodded at Isaac, agreeing with him.

“Great” Scott’s voice rose up in the clinic. “I’m an alpha with performance issues.”

“Is there anyone else besides Derek who could help?” Deaton asked raising his eyebrows up, looking at the teenagers around him.

“I wouldn’t trust Peter” Isaac responded, eliminating one of the choices that were an alpha or used to be one.

“Maybe the twins?” Stiles suggested, he placed his chin on his fist, looking at his friends. His gaze lingered on Stella who was now looking down on the metal table as she grabbed her lower lip between her teeth, thinking about something.

“They’re not alphas anymore” Deaton responded. Stella knew that. The night of the lunar eclipse, Jennifer took that part of theirs away from them, almost killing them but after all, they were okay and alive now and Stella was only focusing on the outcome. “After what Jennifer did, almost killing them?” Stella sighed, crossing her arms in front of her. She didn’t exactly enjoy nor wanted to remember that memory. “It broke that part of them.” Stella felt Isaac’s hand on her back for support, making Stella to look up at him and smile softly and then looked back to her friends.

“Yeah, but what if they know how to do it” Stiles asked, locking his hands together.

“Nobody’s seen them for weeks” Scott murmured, looking at Stiles who was looking Stella.

“Actually, that’s not totally true” Stiles murmured, making everyone to turn to look at Stella.

Stella shrugged. “I can call Aiden if you want?” she suggested like it wasn’t a big deal. Scott nodded, Stella took out her phone from her pocket but before she pressed Aiden’s name on the contact list, she lifted her head up and looked at the boys around her. “Can one of you call Lydia, though? I am tired of you boys and the testosterone in this room is just too much.” Then moved up and down her eyebrows. “Besides, because of this, we have to postpone our movie night and I am not gonna be the one who’s gonna tell her that.”

Stiles slid the door open and as he walked inside the loft with Scott, Stella and Lydia by his side, he let out a small ‘huh’ underneath his breath. Stella frowned, looking around. The loft looked even more empty than the last time she was here which was only few hours ago. “They said they’d meet us here” she murmured, walking down the stairs. She stopped in the middle of the room, felt Lydia and Stiles’ presence near her and then they all startled hearing a punching noise from behind.

Three teenagers quickly looked behind them to see one of the twins punched Scott on the face and without losing anytime, the other one joined. Stiles held Stella and Lydia by the arm and pulled them aside so they wouldn’t get hurt.

The twins grabbed Scott and then threw him downstairs, making him fell onto his face on the ground. Lydia grabbed the back of her neck anxiously as she was looking between Scott and twins who were grinning at each other, probably with the opportunity that they came across since they first came to Beacon Hills. 

Ethan jumped and flipped around in the air over the stairs, landing perfectly on his feet and then looked at Scott, groaning and grunting. He and Aiden walked over to Scott, punched him more. Scott wasn’t doing so good in front of the audience of Stiles who flinched every time twins punched him. The girls kept watching the fight club moment in terror and worriedness as well.

“I thought you guys were gonna teach me to roar” Scott said, not standing up and still laying on the floor with pain rising in his body. There was blood in his nose and in his mouth. Considering he was the only one who got beaten up, it made sense.

“We are” Aiden replied. “You do it by giving in. Giving in and letting go.” As she was listening to Aiden, Stella remembered what Talia Hale told her once in one of her weird hallucinations. _You can only control your powers if you embrace your identity._ She sighed. “That’s how Deucalion taught us control.” He leaned in and grabbed Scott by his shirt, getting him up on his feet.

“Hey, you know, that’s funny” Stiles interrupted. He softly rubbed his lips with his fingers in anxiety and continued. Stella and Lydia were still looking at Scott. “I’ve actually tried something like this one time using a heart monitor and lacrosse balls. But you’re right, beating the living crap out of him is probably a lot better.”

“That’s actually the plan?” Scott questioned as he shouted in disbelief, standing on his feet away from the twins and looking at them. “You kick my ass?”

“You’re afraid to turn” Aiden responded persistently.

“We’re gonna make you turn” Ethan said, continuing his brother’s sentence. As he added a teasing tone in his voice, he parted his lips again jokingly as it was a funny situation that they were in. He smirked. “Then you kick our asses.”

“And then you roar” Aiden finished his sentences. He glowed his blue eyes and then roared like a true alpha with no performance issues on sight whatsoever. Aiden softly chuckled, looking at Scott. They had a plan on making him turn after all. They were gonna piss him off, push him over the edge that he would have to turn.

Ethan started walking in circles around Scott with a mocking smirk on his face like his brother as he parted his lips. “You don’t think you can let go with us?” he teased.

“You think you’re going to hurt us?” Aiden continued and then pushed Scott towards Ethan like they were playing ball with each other. “Come on, McCall. Give it your all.”

Ethan chuckled sarcastically. “We can always heal.” Scott tried to punch him, but Aiden blocked it, punching him back a lot harder.

“I feel like I’ve seen a lot more than necessary cage fights in here” Stella murmured as she was playing with her necklace on her neck with her fingers. Stiles nodded, feeling the same thing as her but he was still looking at his best friend without even blinking.

“You’re an alpha” Aiden told him, pacing around Scott. “If you want to roar like one, you’ve got to give in full throttle. You’ve got to be the monster. Become the beast. Become everything you fear.”

“That’s what’s gonna give you power, give you strength.” Scott tried to punch again, throw a fist but he found himself on his knees, spitting blood on the floor. Stiles closed his eyes for a second, Lydia and Stella grimaced not wanting to see their friend beaten up as the sound of someone, probably Scott, groaning in pain echoed in the almost empty loft.

“Giving into it doesn’t make you the bad guy” Aiden continued.

Hearing that, Ethan turned to look at his twin with a face full of worry as he was thinking about something else too. “As long as you can control it” he corrected him.

Aiden wasn’t too much of a happy with Ethan’s little warning label. “Eh, sometimes control’s a little overrated” he reacted as kicked Scott again, making him groan in pain.

“C’mon Scott, fight back” Stiles murmured underneath his breath, looking at the cage fight that was happening in front of them. This was definitely not the plan, nor it was going the way it was supposed to go.

“What if I can’t control it?” Scott asked, looking at the twins. Stella’s eyes moved to Aiden as she gulped down. “What if I can’t turn back?”

“Then it takes you over” Ethan responded, looking at the young true Alpha in front of them. He continued. “You become Malia. You get further and further away from being human. You turn into an animal. Or worse.”

“You turn into Peter” Aiden said, supporting his brother’s thoughts. Scott got up, wiped away the blood near his lips with the back of his hand and ran towards the twins with a battle cry. Ethan slide to the left, making room for Aiden to grab Scott and pushed him hard onto the table. Lydia looked away, Stella closed her eyes when Scott hit his head to the table pretty bad with a heart crashing bang and a noise.

When Stella opened her eyes back, Aiden was on the top of Scott and hitting him without ever stopping. Seeing them like that, Stella forgot about their plan for a moment, she quickly walked over to them, Stiles and Lydia trying to stop her, but she didn’t care. “Aiden!” Young girl screamed at him. Ethan took a step forward, thinking his brother has gone too far. He was standing right next to Stella while she kept screaming. “Aiden, stop! Stop!”

Aiden was too angry for some reason, kept hitting Scott but then when he was about to hit him again, Ethan quickly stepped in and grabbed his brother’s fist in the air before it could meet Scott’s bloody face. “What?” Aiden groaned, looking at his brother. “I thought we were helping him.”

“You help too much” Ethan responded. Aiden gulped down; his brown eyes moved to Stella who was trying to see if Scott was okay. He was still alive and breathing. He needed couple minutes to heal and get better but other than that he was okay.

Stella gulped, looking back at Aiden who was still looking at her as she sighed. He was still a mystery to her and him beating the crap out of Scott was definitely not helping Stella to figure out those feeling or helping Stella to feel positive things about Aiden.

Aiden left Scott alone, walking away from him. As Stiles and Lydia were walking towards them, Scott turned his head to the side and spit out blood.

“I’m sorry.” As she heard his voice, she instantly turned her head to look at Aiden who was laying against the tree like she was. “I know you see him as a brother, I might have gone too far.” Stella sighed, looking around. They were in the twins’ house. Aiden asked her to come over before their big plan tomorrow to save Malia. Stella left Derek’s jeep back in the loft and since Ethan was gonna be with Danny, Stella thought she could relax a bit and she rode with Aiden to their house in the woods. It was a joy for Stella to ride in his bike, or any bike for that matter, but now… Her mind was thinking, and it was at a level where it hurt her physically.

“Maybe a little” Stella said with a little teasing scoff. She was looking ahead at the view with a light smile on her face. She shrugged. “But you were trying to help, so, uh…” She looked down at her hands which were tangled between them with anxiety. “I don’t really blame you for that.”

Aiden frowned as he’s noticed something in Stella’s voice that concerned him. “Hey, you… You okay?” he asked, worried about the young Argent. Stella sighed, as she lifted her head up and then looked at Aiden. The wind was soft and felt refreshing as Stella and Aiden could feel it on their faces.

Stella gulped down. “I don’t know” she said underneath her breath. She shook her head to both sides, feeling the lump in her throat and looked down at her hands again, playing with her fingers. “I started seeing my dead mother everywhere.” She looked up at Aiden who was looking at her with worry in his eyes. “I see her in my hallucinations. I sometimes hear her voice walking down the hallways or on the streets.” Her eyes were red due to not being able to cry, not wanting to cry. Her throat was burning. Aiden didn’t know what to do as he could see she was hurting. He held her cold hands and covered them with his warm ones. Stella tightened her lips, looking at Aiden. “Am I going crazy?” She sighed. “I am, aren’t I?”

“No, Stella” he said, trying to calm her down as he was rubbing and squeezing her hands. He slightly shook his head as he continued, looking into her eyes. “You’re not.”

“Then why do I keep hearing a dead bitch’s voice everywhere I go?” Stella questioned with her shaky voice, freeing her hands from Aiden’s grip. She stood up, pulling her hair out in frustration. She walked away from him, closing her eyes shut. She took a deep breath, she turned around and looked at Aiden with tears in her eyes. “Why do I keep feeling that bitch is still alive?”

Aiden didn’t know what to say as he kept looking at her. Stella sniffed and as she kept her brown eyes on him, a tear slipped down to her chin. 

Stella and Stiles climbed out of the blue jeep and looked at Scott who was taking his helmet off as they quickly walked over to Lydia, Isaac and Allison who were standing near Allison’s car. 6 of them shared a quick look for a second between each other.

They had no idea what they were going to do or how they were going to do it. Stella believed in Scott and his plan but honestly, she was having trouble of trusting his roar. Allison’s hands were still shaking. And the worst part was that Allison and Scott was the main part of their dangerous plan. Scott had to roar in order for Malia to turn back to human but before that… Allison needed to shoot properly. Actually, Stella could make the shot for her cousin but then she knew what Allison would feel and it wouldn’t help her recovery from this bardo crap.

“Anyone else think we might be doing more harm than good?” Lydia asked, breaking the silence between them. Stella tightened his lips, pressing them together and slowly raised her index finger up in the air. She thought there were more things to it that they didn’t know.

“We’re trying to keep a father from killing his own daughter” Scott reminded them, looking back and forth between the two girls.

“Actually…” Isaac interrupted. “… we’re trying to keep a guy from killing a coyote who is actually his daughter, who we don’t know how to change from a coyote back to his daughter.”

Scott closed his eyes in exhaustion, Stiles raised his eyebrows and smiled sarcastically as his brown eyes found Isaac. “And, again, with the not helping” he reacted, spreading his hands to sides as he was looking at them causing Isaac to smile back in a sarcastic way and nod.

In another moment in their lives, Stella would love to watch them argue over stupid and little things as they were so opposite from each other but right now… Well, she felt like a train wreck. 

“Did you bring it?” Scott asked, ignoring them and turning to Allison. She looked at him for a while and then suddenly walked over to her car, opened the trunk with one slight move and took out a gun with a long barrel. She closed down the trunk, looked at the others at the same time a gunshot was heard in the distance.

Everyone started looking around, trying to see something as they heard the gunshot echoing through the woods again, but everyone already knew it was Mr. Tate trying to kill the coyote that was actually his daughter.

Scott quickly put his helmet on again and hopped on his bike. As he started to ride away, Stiles quickly took a step forward towards Scott and Stella yelled after him, trying to stop him. “Wait, wait. Wait! Wait!”

But Scott was already long gone in the woods and without losing time, Isaac run after him.

“It took the doll again?” Stiles repeated in disbelief, listening to his father on the phone, brushing his hair back. After Scott took off, Stiles called his dad to let him know what happened but according to the phone call that Stella could barely hear the other line, Sheriff already was aware of the messed-up situation. “What the hell is so important about this doll?” Stiles listened to his father for a while. Stella chose little words like ‘traps’ and ‘stay out’ but not hearing the whole thing, it didn’t make complete sense but even if it did, they would never stay out of the woods anyway.

They had someone to save.

“It’s the doll” Stella murmured, trying to think about it. Why on God’s green earth a doll could be that important for someone who was stuck in an animal body for years? What was it about this freaky, creepy doll?

Stiles, hearing Stella, hung up the phone and like Lydia, he turned to look at her. “It’s the doll?” he asked frowning as he was looking at the Young Argent across him. He hung up the phone not to lie to his father and he thought Stella had a theory but now she was silent, and it drove Stiles nuts.

Meanwhile, Stella was thinking about the picture at the Tate house. She lifted her head up and shook her head slightly. “It’s about the doll” she repeated again.

Stiles kneeled down to the ground thoughtfully. He sighed; his fingers were playing with his lips nervously. “Alright, but why would it go all the way to the school and then all the way back to the house just for the doll?” he questioned. “One that was in the car wreck in the first place? We didn’t find it in the coyote den.”

“It likes the doll, who cares?” Lydia responded, pacing up and down as she was trying to think. Stella took a deep breath, not knowing what to do like the rest of them. She was trying to think just like Lydia was. Allison was gone after Isaac; Stiles, Lydia and Stella were still at the ground zero with nothing else to do.

“It likes the doll a lot” Stiles murmured. He was also thinking but no one seemed to find a connection between a coyote and a doll.

Lydia stopped walking and looked at Stiles. “What kind of doll is it?” she asked, playing with her fingers.

“I don’t know, it’s a doll, you know” Stilinski answered the strawberry blonde-haired girl. “It’s got little arms, a big baby head and dead soulless eyes.” Stella knew the fact that he was thinking about the whole ‘I’m hungry’ situation near the car wreck where they were almost scared to death. He stood up and walked over the Lydia as he pulled up his phone. “Actually, I took a picture.” He showed her the picture. “Here.”

Lydia pointed a girl as Stella stood right next to her. She was trying to see if there was something they’ve missed. “That’s Malia?” Lydia asked.

“Yeah, that’s the jacket and the scarf we found in the den” Stella murmured, looking at the picture a lot focused and a lot closer. She frowned and reached for the phone. “Can I see that?” She looked a lot closer than before and then… she noticed something else. Something important… Young Argent frowned. “Stilinski.” Stiles quickly turned his head to look at her. Stella gave him a quick look and then went back to the phone as she pointed something on the picture. “She’s not holding the doll.”

“That’s Malia’s younger sister” Stiles murmured, taking his phone back from Stella as he was looking at the picture. “It’s her doll.” He lifted his head up to look at Lydia and Stella. “I know what she’s doing.”

“What?” Lydia asked, looking at Stiles.

Stiles sighed, looking back to his phone. “I know where she’s going.”

As they discovered something big, they started to follow Stiles into the woods, but a scream rose through the woods causing Stella to stop walking instantly and look around. She immediately knew it was Isaac which was the whole reason why she was no longer walking. She felt the worry rising inside her, she somehow knew Isaac was in trouble and no stupid doll was important than him at the moment.

Lydia and Stiles could deal with it by themselves.

“Okay” Stella said quickly, not letting them or giving them a chance to speak. “I’m gonna look for Isaac and you, uh, you do whatever you’re gonna do.” Stella quickly turned around, started running into the woods where the scream came from. She could hear Stiles yelling after her, but she didn’t stop.

Stiles’ anxious voice rose through the woods but by that time, him and Lydia were already all alone. “Stella!”

When she found Isaac, she saw his leg was trapped in a very sharp and pointy trap. She let out a sharp breath that was full of worry between her parted lips and she ran to Allison and Isaac that she saw ahead. Allison was lifting her gun to aim; Isaac was on the floor with a trap on his leg as he was watching Allison.

Stella, seeing Isaac was okay for now, walked over to her cousin.

“You can do this” she murmured, giving support to her cousin. She put her hand on her shoulder, causing her to look at Stella over her shoulder. “If you want me to… If you feel like you want me to, I still can do it. I can help everything I have for you to close that door after but… Make the first and second shot.”

Allison nodded, understanding what she was talking. She let out a breath and then aimed again with another deep breath. “Okay, okay, come on” she murmured. Her hands started shaking like her voice. She pulled the trigger but the it hit the tree instead of Mr. Tate. Allison quickly looked at Stella. “Stella, I…”

“Allison” Stella said with a sharp as a knife voice, determined. She knew her cousin was capable of doing that, even with a freaking ajar door in her mind. “Breath.” She knew they didn’t have time, but Argents would never give up, so, she kept staring at Allison. “You can do this.”

“Stella-”

“I swear to God, Argent, if you don’t make that shot, I am going to kick your ass” Stella said, interrupting her. “Take a deep breath and do what you are good at. Make the goddamn shot.” Allison took a deep breath, closing her eyes and then she picked up the gun again. She aimed and hit Mr. Tate from the shoulder. His gun and his body met the floor. She started smiling, looking back at it again but they were gone. “She’s gone.”

Stella ran towards Isaac and kneeled near him, looking at her cousin. “Allison, you should go find Scott. He might need some help.” Before she held the trap to help Isaac get free from it, she kept looking at her cousin. “Coyotes and wolves, Allison. Help him.”

Allison nodded, running into the woods to find Scott. Stella sighed and looked at Isaac.

“Scott, it’s me” Stiles said, starting to record his message to Scott who he called right after Stella left them alone in the woods. “You got to call me as soon as you can. It wasn’t Malia’s doll; it was her sister’s.” Stiles kept walking with Lydia by his side. “Malia left it at the car for her sister. It’s like bringing flowers to a grave.” Stiles stopped in the middle of the woods, looking around. Lydia stopped as well by reflex. “Okay, and we stole the flowers. So, that’s all she’s trying to do, right, bring the doll back to the grave, to the car wreck. That’s where she’s headed. The car wreck.”

“Stiles?” Lydia’s anxious and scared voice rose through the woods as Stiles put the phone back in his pocket and when he turned around to see what was happening, he held his breath. Lydia’s foot was standing on one of those traps that Mr. Tate randomly build up in the woods. “Stiles!”

“Lydia, don’t move!” Stiles took a step forward towards Lydia with his hands in front of him, trying to tell her to calm down with his body language. Even Stiles could feel the fear radiating from the young girl.

Lydia took and gave out few heavily breathes, trying to calm down but it was nearly impossible with the possibility of her foot being chopped off by a trap. “Look for a warning label!” she frightenedly told him. 

“A warning label?” Stiles repeated in question.

“Instructions on how to disarm it!” Lydia explained with a voice full of fear.

“Lydia, why the hell would they put instructions on the bottom of a trap?” Stiles asked, the anxiety and the panic and the fear rising up inside him way more quickly than needed at the moment.

“Because animals can’t read!”

Stiles quickly kneeled down and carefully cleared the grasses around the trap, trying to look for the label Lydia told him about. He found it few seconds later but there was something else that was wrong. “Lydia, we got a problem” he said. He looked up at Lydia who was looking back at him with terror in her eyes. He sighed, noticing the way his heart started beating, faster. “I can’t read either.”

Lydia gave out a deep breath between her lips and very confidently, she looked at Stiles. “You don’t need instructions” she said, hearing Stiles’ breathings full of anxiousness. Her eyes started to tear up with the fear and adrenaline she was feeling. “When was the last time you’ve ever used instructions, am I right?” Stiles turned his head to look at Lydia, away from the warning label he couldn’t read. “You don’t need them, because you are too smart to waste your time with them, okay? You can figure it out.” She took a deep breath. “Stiles… You are the one who always figures it out.” She slightly nodded and continued. “So, you can do it. Figure. It. out.”

Stiles heard the young girl, took a deep breath and wiped away the sweats on his forehead smoothly with the back of his hand before he looked at the trap again. He sharply exhaled and as he looked around the trap, trying to find something to defuse it, something caught his attention.

A wheel that could be turned, and it would affect the speed that trap closes with…

He cleared the dust and the grasses in front of it, looked at it closely, more detailed and took a deep breath. He looked at Lydia for a moment. “Okay, here we go.” He looked back at the trap, his hand went near the switch and slowly gave out his breath. “Ready?” Lydia nodded in fear, gasping. “Okay, here we go.” He turned the thing really quickly and as Lydia screamed in fear again, she quickly pulled her leg to each other and as the trap closed down with a loud voice, Stiles pulled her into his arms.

As they were looking at each other, Stiles’ hand was moving up and down on Lydia’s shoulder to calm her down.

Scott grew his claws out as he was running after Malia who was still trapped inside the coyote body. His fangs came out, and as he was slowly becoming a full werewolf, he kept running. He growled, not leaving Malia’s tail even for a second.

When he finally caught up with the coyote, they were near the car wreck. He jumped over the big rock, over the car and fell right in front of Malia, cutting her way. She growled, looking at him and showing her teeth angrily but Scott glowed his red alpha eyes and looked at the coyote.

And then… he roared.

It was such a loud and powerful roar that it reached out to Stella and Isaac, Stiles and Lydia through the woods, through the miles between them.

Hearing his roar in the distance, Stiles and Lydia formed up a proud smile on their faces, stopping on their spot and looking at the direction they heard the roar from. “That’s what I’m talking about” Stiles exclaimed, proud of his alpha best friend.

Meanwhile when Scott roared, Stella and Isaac were still trying to get Isaac’s leg which was bleeding bad, out of the trap. Allison’s just left them, and they were all alone. Stella sighed, looking at Isaac. “C’mon Lahey.” And then they both tried to push to force the trap open and all of a sudden, hearing Scott’s roar, Stella felt an incredible pain in her head. She had to leave the metal and her hands found her skull, pushing it like it was going to help with the pain. She groaned and screamed in agony, falling onto the ground.

The trap closed back with Isaac’s groan but Scott’s roar gave him the strength he needed. He pulled up all of his werewolf juice and opened the trap, getting himself out.

The minute he was out, he ran towards Stella who was on the ground with her eyes shut, groaning in pain. Isaac held Stella’s hands and her shoulder, suddenly feeling the pain she had which shocked and worried him at the same time. “Stella!” He tried to see her face, but Stella couldn’t let go off her head which she was holding between her palms. “Stella, you okay? Stella!” She could hear Isaac’s worried voice and she could feel Isaac’s hands on her body but the pain and the ache inside her brain was blocking everything else and she couldn’t focus.

And then it stopped. All of a sudden, it went away as fast as it came. Stella opened her brown eyes, looking at Isaac. He was as shocked and confused as she was. She blinked few times, trying to figure out what’s going on, but she had no idea. “I’m…” she murmured, confused. “I’m okay.”

“Are you sure?” Isaac asked. “I felt your pain, Ella. It was… It was too much.” Stella’s hand moved up and down on her arm as she thought about the incredible pain that she felt not too long ago. Isaac continued, asking. “What happened?”

Stella gulped down and as she looked at Isaac, she had no answer to give it to him. 

Scott looked at the coyote with blue eyes glowing after he stopped roaring and few seconds later, it was no longer a coyote. Where coyote used to be, now there was a naked and scared girl on the ground. Malia Tate... She was back to human and with her really messy brown hair and terrified, confused and lost brown eyes. 

She tried to straighten up, taking deep breaths and looking around. Scott stood up, not believing that he actually did it.

Sheriff took the young girl to his house until morning so that they could take her back to her dad, Mr. Tate. Stella stayed at the Stilinski’s resident that night to help Malia to get her ready, take a shower and give her clothes. That’s what she told everyone anyway, but Stiles knew the truth.

The next day, Stiles and Stella were watching sheriff guide Malia to Mr. Tate’s house from the squad car. She took a shower; her hair was combed, and she was dressed as she was walking towards her dad’s porch.

Stella and Stiles watched a daughter and a dad reunite after so many years from inside the car. They saw the emotional hug, tears in Mr. Tate’s eyes. Sheriff turned to look at them with a smile. Stella smiled back, Stiles softly gave him a thumbs up and he looked at the side mirror. Stella watched Stiles, realizing that he could now read and closed the door in his mind.

She slowly leaned back, watching Stiles’ relieve smile and then her eyes dropped on her hands, watching them as she nervously crossed them together. She remembered what happened when she was trying to find Isaac in the woods yesterday. 

_**** Stella stopped as she heard a howl not too long after she was separated from Lydia and Stiles, looking for Isaac. A wolf’s howl and, somehow, she knew it wasn’t Scott or Isaac. She turned around to see the same wolf was hurting under the hands of a hunter. Stella’s heartbeats got faster; her breathings got heavier. The wolf’s brown eyes suddenly started to glow bright blue. She looked at the hunter, and knowing who it was, she felt her throat got dry._

_Right when she took a step towards them, they were gone._

_“Stella” a voice said somewhere near her. It was her mother again. It was Kate Argent. Her heart was about to burst out of her chest, she turned around where she thought she heard the voice from but there was nothing else. “I’m here, Stella.” She felt someone running behind her but when she looked, there was no one. There were only trees and empty. She gave out a breath in frustration. She remembered the things she talked with Aiden the other night. She tried to remind herself that it wasn’t real. “Stella!”_

_She closed her eyes because it sounded so real._

_“Allison, there he is.” Isaac’ voice cut the hallucination, causing Stella to snap out of it. “Hit Tate. Use the tranq on him.” Stella stopped, opened her eyes and shook her head to get herself together. She quickly ran towards where she heard the voice and she saw Isaac on the ground with his leg trapped and Allison was aiming. She tried to calm down as she walked over to her cousin and her friend. ****_

She sighed. “The door is still open” she murmured with a voice that only she could hear. When she heard the door open, she lifted her head up to look at Sheriff who was putting on his seatbelt on as he looked at Stiles and Stella with a proud smile.


	15. GALVANIZE

“Get your ass down here now” Stiles ordered to Scott over the phone. “We have a job to do.”

It was closing down to midnight and he was at the school with Stella because Halloween was just around the corner and tomorrow happened to be their beloved Coach’s birthday and also the Mischief night. And with that day so full… they thought a little harmless joke wouldn’t hurt anyone.

Well… Stiles thought, Stella agreed and Scott probably was probably… not on board with the plan because he wasn’t at the school with them.

“Dude, I’m already in bed” Scott argued back with a slight chuckle. Stella rolled her eyes as she heard the alpha through the speaker phone that Stiles put so that they both could hear him and he could do whatever he was going to do a lot more easily. “And aren’t we getting a little old for this?”

“Get your werewolf ass out of the bed and get here now McCall” Stella protested, looking at the phone as she kept walking down the hall side by side with Stiles. Pulling pranks on other people was not about age at all. Scott should’ve known that by now, hanging around with Stella and Stiles. Yes, Stella was more on the ground, realistic kind of gal but there was also a part of her that was like that. She had fun doing that, being a kid. Because she was never one in the first place. Hunters were never kids, whether they were constantly on the road like other hunters or they were living in mansions, living a normal life till the night, like Stella. It was just the way it is so when they had an opportunity to be a kid… Well, every hunter would take it. “Besides, we do this _for_ Coach.”

Scott was surprised at first, hearing her voice over the phone but then he remembered how much she liked this kind of mischievousness and how she was avoiding spending time with Allison lately with various reasons that she was coming up with. Everyone knew that. Everyone noticed that but no one had the balls to open up the topic and ask her about it.

That’s why Scott played it cool and softly laughed. “I thought we were doing this _to_ Coach” he said.

“Oh, so you are aware of the plan?” Stella reacted sarcastically with a soft smile on her face.

“Whatever, okay?” Stiles interrupted both of them. “You know he needs this. He lives for this stuff. He loves it.”

“But it’s the middle of the night” Scott said, causing Stella to roll her eyes at the alpha again.

“And if you don’t come here right now, I’ll split you in half with my Argent skills that I am pretty sure that are not rusty at all” She threatened teasingly. Scott softly chuckled. “You know me well enough to know this is not an empty threat.”

Of course, he knew.

He gave out his breath as Stiles and Stella stopped in front of the locker room that they were looking for in the first place. Stiles quickly opened the door and handed the flashlight over to Stella for her to hold it for him. It was his plan in the first place, so Stella didn’t mind. She just wanted to get out of the house. “Actually it’s 00:15” Stiles corrected him, looking at his watch. “Which means it’s after midnight and officially Mischief Night/Day…” He took out a yellow drill from his locker and he checked if it was working before he put it into his bag. “… and, by perfectly awesome coincidence, it’s also happens to be Coach’s birthday.” As he grabbed few more items from his locker, from the corner of his eyes, he looked at Stella’s phone to see the time. “So, if you are not down here in five seconds, I will destroy you. Okay? And I mean five, four, three, two-”

Then they heard someone in the back, causing them to jump with fear, startle. “One.” Scott’s eyes flowed back from red to usual color brown with a grin. Stella gave out a sharp breath, looking at Scott with a grumpy look.

“I hate you” Stiles murmured.

“And I hate the fact that you do this every time because now you are the big alpha wolf with no performance issues” Stella ranted, Scott’s smile getting deeper. She gave out a big breath, put her hand on her forehead. “God.”

“Why aren’t you coming to school with Allison?” Stiles asked few minutes after he picked Stella up from Argent’s apartment. Her car was officially dead, and she didn’t have time to go to the gallery to get herself a new one yet. That’s why she was constantly asking Stiles or Scott or even Isaac to pick her up and they were all trying their best to do that.

Stiles was her usual ride to school, though. Mostly because their schedule was a lot similar.

“You’re not trying to kick me out of your car, right Stilinski?” Stella playfully questioned with a smile. She knew it wasn’t true, well, it could be, but it wasn’t. She just didn’t want to answer the question Stiles asked her and she wasn’t going to answer that question, so she was trying to divert the topic away from the question.

Stiles, understanding her, softly laughed to play along. Stella was grateful for that. “Definitely no, I am getting used to it actually” he said with a smile as he drove the jeep into the parking lot. As he was acting like he forgot what he asked already, he frowned with the scene he saw from the corner of his eyes. “Look at that” he said, pointing something, more like someone, far away from them. “What the hell are they doing here?”

Stella was definitely surprised seeing Aiden and Ethan in the school lot. Scott was taking his helmet off as he was looking at them as surprised as they were. Stiles parked the jeep; she took the seatbelt off. “I have no idea.” She looked at Stiles and then reached for the door handle to get out of the car. “Let’s find out.” They got out of the jeep, looked at the twins. “Aiden? Ethan?” She frowned as she stood between Stiles and Scott. She thought they were never coming back to school, hence the shock in her voice. “You’re back in school?”

“No” Ethan replied in place of his twin as well. “Just to talk.”

“Oh, that’s kind of a change of pace for you guys” Stiles responded, raising his eyebrows in a sarcastic way as he was looking at the twins. He could still remember the time they beat the crap out of Scott and the ones before that and before that. “Usually, you’re just hurting, maiming and killing.”

Hearing that, Stella tightened her lips, making them a straight line on her face. Her arms got crossed in front of her chest and as she narrowed down her eyes due to the sunlight coming down on her, she looked at the twins.

Meanwhile, Aiden ignored Stiles as he turned his head to look at Scott. “You need a pack. We need an alpha” he said, causing Stella to frown her brows and look at the twin in the blue shirt.

“You want in the pack?” she asked, not being able to hide how surprised she was as she raised her eyebrows. Aiden nodded, confirming her.

Stiles chuckled sarcastically. “Yeah, absolutely not” he responded, looking back and forth between Aiden and Ethan. “That’s hilarious though.”

“You came to us for help. We helped” Aiden argued, looking at Stiles. He was slowly getting frustrated. Stella could see that. She knew they didn’t like each other very much, not even after everything.

“You beat his face into a bloody pulp” Stiles reminded, slightly shrugged and continued. “That’s not helping. In my opinion, that’s actually counter-productive.”

“Why would I say yes?” Scott asked after Stiles stopped talking, ignoring but agreeing with his attitude. His eyes moved from Stiles to twins in the blue and green t-shirts.

“We’d add strength, we’d make you more powerful” Aiden explained. Stella softly scoffed, not surprised. That was such an Aiden thing to say after all. “There’s no reason to say no.” Stiles rolled his eyes; Stella’s hand went up to the back of her neck with a deep breath.

That’s when they heard Isaac, causing all of them to look at the werewolf who was walking towards them with the hate he had for the twins in his eyes. “I can think of one” he interrupted them, looking at them, his hands in his jeans’ pocket. “Like the two of you holding Derek’s claws while Kali impaled Boyd.” Stella tried not to react as she got reminded the memory by Isaac, but everyone knew she was constantly thinking about it. Especially Isaac… And knowing it well, it was the memory he picked as he crossed his arms in front of him. His eyes moved between Stella, Stiles and Scott. “In fact, I don’t know why we’re not impaling them right now.”

Aiden quickly turned to Isaac, glowing his blue eyes and his fangs coming out. “You want to try?” he said, provoking Isaac who was ready to walk towards Aiden with his crocked sided smile, but Scott stopped him, putting his hand on his chest. His eyes found Stella who had her hands in a fist. Maybe she had complicated feelings and unsolved things for Aiden but Isaac? He was one of her best friends and no one had the right to hurt him.

No matter who ever thought doing that was.

Stella felt Scott’s brown eyes on her, telling her to calm down. She sighed silently, taking a step back and dropping her shoulders. She crossed her arms in front of her chest and slowly shook her head. Isaac caught her chemo signals, knew exactly what she was feeling. That was the reason he stood down. He knew the anger she was feeling was for Aiden and not himself. He was still worried about after the thing that happened back in the woods.

“Sorry, but they don’t trust you” Scott said, looking at the twins. “And neither do I.” Stiles and Scott walked right past twins, as Isaac looked at Stella and put his hand on her waist like he wanted to annoy Aiden. As he was guiding her into the school, Aiden gave out a sharp breath from his nose. Hearing that, Isaac slowly laughed under his sleeve and walked away from the twins with Stella by his side.

“What now?” Ethan asked when it was just the two of them. Aiden paced up and down for a while, thinking and then his eyes stopped on a spot. It was the ‘Beacon Hills High’ sign that was covered with toilet paper due to Mischief Day. Seeing the smile on his face, Ethan looked at the spot Aiden was looking at and as he started shaking his head no, he turned back to look at his brother. “No. No way.”

“We never finished” Aiden responded with a smile.

“And we don’t have to” Ethan responded back, definitely terrified with the thought of going to school just to get in a pack.

“What if I want to?” Aiden’s brown eyes were locked on his brother, still with the crocked grin on his face.

Ethan looked at the sign again and then back to his brother. “You… You seriously want to go back to high school?” he curiously questioned in disbelief. He couldn’t believe his brother at all. But then he remembered what Isaac did and what was Aiden’s reaction to it just few minutes ago. He did the simple math in his mind. He frowned. “Is this about Stella?”

“This is about getting Scott to change his mind” Aiden said quickly, giving Ethan the real answer without even voicing it. Obviously, he wasn’t only thinking about the whole Scott and the pack problem, but he was definitely not going to say the real reason in his mind out loud. Especially, not to his brother. Aiden could still remember the thing Ethan told him back at the hospital when they were trying to find Jennifer. “We’re not just Betas anymore. We’re Omegas. The bitches, remember?” He looked at his brother. “When everyone we’ve screwed over finds out we don’t have a pack anymore, what do you think’s going to happen? We are dead on our own.”

“That’s still better than being back in high school.” Ethan sighed, looking at his brother. “I’m not doing it. No way.” Ethan smiled and as he was getting ready to leave the school’s parking lot, he saw his brother’s eyes stuck at one point again with another teasing grin on his face. “What?” Ethan turned his head to look at where Aiden was looking and the only thing that he saw was Danny talking to some cute boy in such an intimate way. Aiden’s lips shaped in an annoying ‘o’ as he was making fun of his brother. Ethan quickly looked at Aiden. “I’m not taking math.”

Aiden laughed. “I’ll take it for you” he responded to his brother and as Ethan was still looking at Danny and the guy, Aiden turned around walked over to the school.

“Have I ever told you before how happy I am that you saw Aiden’s real face at last?” Isaac amusingly asked with a smile as they walked inside the halls, looking at the young girl next to him. His hand was no longer on her waist, but they were walking side by side in sync down the halls.

Stella rolled her eyes softly and chuckled. As she shook her head, she looked at Isaac. “Who said I see his ‘ _real face’_ Lahey, ha?” Stella responded with another question, raising her eyebrows. She stood in front of her locker and did her combination. She pulled the locker to herself, opening it.

“The reaction you had on your face back in the parking lot” Isaac responded frowning and leaning against to Allison’s locker who was nowhere to be seen just yet.

“That only happened because of the fact that Aiden was about to attack you and you brought up Boyd” she explained, grabbing the giant book of Economy and then put every little thing into it, locking up her locker afterwards. She looked at Isaac, shrugged. “Besides… He, uh, he changed. After Deucalion, he’s been different. You don’t know the half of it.” She bit her lower lip, looking at her friend. “He kind of… helped me in some ways.” But then before Isaac could say anything, she waggled her eyebrows and sighed as she continued. “But…” she said, stretching the ‘u’s in the word. “I agree with not letting them join the pack, though.” Isaac eyed her for a good second and then straightened up, nodding. Meanwhile, Stella noticed Scott and Stiles walking inside. She turned to look at Isaac and brushed her hair back. “Hey, we have…” She pointed Scott and Stiles with a nod. “… the same class as them. Are you coming?”

Isaac nodded. “I need to get something from my locker” he responded. “I’ll join you later.” Stella nodded okay and as Isaac patted her shoulder goodbye, she turned around walked up to Scott and Stiles.

As Stella and Isaac were talking in the distance in front of her locker, Stiles softly patted on Scott’s shoulder and kept walking to his locker with Scott by his side. “Hey, dude, good decision, buddy. Good alpha decision” he enjoyingly said.

“I hope so” Scott responded underneath his breath as Stiles grabbed his bag, bringing it to in front of him. His eyes found Stella and Isaac for a second but quickly looked back to his locker and entered the combination.

“No, you know so” he heatedly corrected him as he quickly opened his locker. Scott leaned his shoulder against the locker next to Stiles’ and started looking around until his brown eyes found someone far away. When Stiles noticed the mood change in his eyes, Stella was walking towards them. “What are you looking at?” Stiles asked as he looked over to see Kira grabbing her books off the floor and putting them back to her locker.

“Me?” Scott asked right when Stella stood next to Stiles who nodded her ‘hey’ and then looked back to his locker.

“Yes, you” Stiles replied, Stella leaned her back to one of the lockers and looked at what Scott was looking at, seeing Kira. “You looking at her?”

“Her?” Scott asked, still confused. Stella chuckled, shaking her head as she was looking down and then back to Scott with a smile. “Who her?”

Stella rolled her eyes, while Stiles took a cartoon of eggs from his bag and put them into his locker. Stella smiled and looked at Scott. “The new girl Kira, obviously” her responded for Stiles, joining the conversation. She crossed her arms in front of her chest, wrinkling the black shirt she was wearing. She raised her eyebrows and tilted her head. “You like her?”

Stiles quickly looked at his best friend, waiting for him to answer Stella’s question. Not thinking clearly, Scott started talking automatically with a defense mechanism. “No” he answered quicker than he should’ve and then as he realized what the hell he said, he shook his head fast and continued. “I mean, yeah.” He shrugged like it was no big deal, meanwhile Stella grabbed Stiles’ economy book that he was handing out to her and put it on hers. “Yeah, she’s okay. She is new.”

Stiles zipped back his bag, while Stella stopped looking at Kira who was walking away from them and looked at Scott. “So…” She shrugged. “Ask her out.”

Scott’s eyes found Stella, but he was looking at her a little surprised. “You’re saying that?” he questioned, feeling shocked. He raised his brows up. Stella’s expression was asking Scott the reason why he was so surprised. He slightly scoffed. “Stella, you don’t like Kira that much.”

Stella shrugged. “Maybe” she said, wrinkling up her lips. “But that’s not going to change how you feel about her, so, I say do not care about what other people think and go for it.”

Stiles hung his bag on his shoulder and nodded, agreeing with Stella. “Yeah, dude, go ask her out.”

“Now?”

Stella rolled her eyes. She had no idea what was happening with him today but then she remembered how he was acting around Allison when there was no problem and there were just them. She didn’t like the thought but mainly because of what she was feeling about Kira and Allison was her cousin, but she was standing behind what she said. He shouldn’t have cared what other people would think and do what he wanted to do.

But still…

“No, please wait until the world comes to an end and we all die” she sarcastically responded. Stiles shook his head once again, agreeing with Stella as he grabbed his economy book from Stella. “Yes, now.”

“Like right now?” Scott asked once again. Stella gave out a breath in frustration and shook her hand in the air, letting them now she was done with Scott’s stupidity for the day.

They started walking towards their class. “Right now!” Stiles stopped, looking at Scott as Stella sighed but stopping alongside them. “Scott, I don’t think you get it yet.” He tapped on his shoulder couple of times. “You’re and alpha. You’re the apex predator.” He smiled lightly. “Everyone wants you. You’re like the hot girl that every guy wants.”

Isaac who only caught that part of the conversation was looking at Stella as he was trying to make it make sense in his mind and he was confused as hell. But as Stella shook her head, not even want to deal with it, Scott frowned with the image that Stiles used. “The hot girl?”

“Not the phrase I would use” Stella chuckled with a smile that said ‘I can’t believe the weird conversation we are currently having but I am not that surprised’ as she was looking at Scott with soft brown eyes. “But yeah, that’s kind of… true.”

“You are the hottest girl” Stiles continued before he walked away with Stella to their first class of the day. Scott was looking after his friends with a confused Isaac by his side.

“What?” he asked, not understanding anything.

But instead of explaining the situation, Scott parted his lips with an empty expression. “I’m the hot girl” he said.

Even though Isaac had no idea what was happening, he nodded. “Yes, you are” he agreed, making Scott smile. As Scott walked away, Isaac followed the alpha with a smile in disbelief but entertained.

Stiles, Stella and Scott were sitting right next to each other, waiting for Coach’s reaction to the big surprise they prepared for him last night… Well, technically early this morning. They were looking at each other, talking, waiting for that hilarious reaction.

And then they heard it.

“Son of a bitch!” His loud voice echoed in his office and then traveled outside all to way to them, making everyone in the class room laugh. All the eyes moved to the ‘exit’ door that they heard the voice from and then watched Coach enter the classroom, slamming the door behind him and then he looked at the students. “Mischief Night, Devil’s Night... I don’t care what you call it.” He threw the pen he was holding at them, but it didn’t hit anyone. “You little punks are evil.” The trio were laughing at it like it was the most hilarious thing in the world and for Stella, maybe it wasn’t the most, but it was definitely one of those. “You think it’s funny every Halloween my house gets egged? A man’s house is supposed to be his castle.” Scott kept laughing but then Coach angrily hit his desk, putting his hands on it. “Mine’s a freaking omelet.” He walked over to his desk and grabbed a wrapped gift box. Stella frowned with the sight of it, knowing it wasn’t theirs. “Oh, this? We are gonna do this again?” He dropped the box onto the ground with his gaze on the students. “I don’t think so.” He stepped on it, but it was followed by a cracking and a breaking sound. Coach got surprised, kneeled down and saw what was actually in the box. A broken cup with a little note in it… “Happy Birthday. Love Greenberg” he read and maybe for the first time in forever, he felt bad for the kid.

Stella softly scoffed but then thinking, the fun was over, she looked down at her phone but then she heard something, a buzzing near her ear. She shook her hand around her head to get rid of the buzzing sound that sounded like a fly. She looked around with knotted eyebrows but didn’t realize that Lydia was hearing the same sound.

As Stella was shaking her head and hand to get rid of the fly, the girl sitting next to her frowned in confusion, looking at the young girl. They didn’t have that much of a conversation, but she knew her and what she was doing was bizarre. “Uhhhh, what the hell are you doing?” Vianey asked, causing her to sigh in frustration and looked at her.

“There’s a goddamn fly I’d like to murder, thank you very much” she responded in frustration, causing Vianey to look around and then turn back to Stella.

“Have you lost your mind?” she questioned. Stella stopped as she heard her and looked at her in confusion. “There is no _goddamn fly_ in the class.” She rolled her eyes and looked back at board. As she shook her head, she sighed in frustration. “Pinches Americanos.”

Stella was too distracted to actually care about what she said even though she understood Spanish. She lifted her head up, looking at the ceiling, realizing that the flies were the voices in her head.

As Derek stitched Peter’s finger back to its place, he thought about what happened again. They went to Mexico because there was something that was in Calaveras’ possession and Derek had to get it but then the Calaveras captured them and asked things about La Loba and the she wolf which they had no idea about. Then the woman who was hired by Deucalion and who saved Isaac before… That woman whose name was Braeden saved their werewolf asses from the Calaveras, grabbed the thing Derek wanted and then the Hale wolves came back to the loft, trying to make Peter’s finger a whole again that was cut in half by Severo. “Ow” Peter screamed in pain. He looked up at Derek. “Don’t you have anesthetic?”

“Yep.” Derek continued his work as Peter rolled his eyes.

“Well, are you at least going to tell me what I risked my life and digit for?” he questioned as Derek ripped of the thread he was using, causing Peter to jump on his spot with pain.

Derek looked down at his uncle. “I’m going to show you” he answered and then turned around to grab the box with the ALPHA-BETA-OMEGA symbol on which they picked up at Mexico. He turned it two times right, pulled it up, two times left. The box opened. Derek swung the box to the table in front of them, causing what’s inside to fall down on the table. Peter looked up from his stitched finger, grabbed one of the things. Knowing what it was, his eyes opened widely in shock. Derek explained. “After the fire, that’s all that was left of her.”

Peter looked at Derek. “Talia” he murmured. “I can’t decide if that’s touching or morbid.” Derek scowled, telling him to shut up. “But I guess the real question is, what are you planning on doing with them?”

“I have to ask her something” Derek responded with a soft voice. “And from what I’ve heard, this is the only way it’s possible.” He put the box down on the table as Peter was looking at his fingers.

When he realized what Derek was talking about, he quickly turned to look at his niece. “You gotta be kidding me” he ranted.

Derek sarcastically tilted his head. “Why do you think I sewed your finger?”

“Sheriff? Sheriff?” Hearing Melissa calling for him, he rolled his eyes thinking about the whole non-sense as he started to walk over to the young woman. First, they had to bring a guy to the hospital who tried to murder bunch of kids, killed few of them, maimed some of them. And then flies went out from his stomach, he woke up from the narcosis, attacked a doctor with a knife, stole and ambulance and drove away. And now they had no idea where that psychopath was, and they had to find them as soon as possible. “These dead flies everywhere? They came out of Barrow. Out of his tumor” Melissa informed him when he stood right in front of her.

Sheriff frowned, looking at Melissa. “Is that even possible?” he questioned disbelief.

“Maggots can come from the body” Melissa answered, explaining. “It’s called myiasis.” Sheriff rubbed his face with his hands, trying to get his thoughts back together. Melissa continued. “But from the stomach? It’s not likely.” She took a deep breath and as she gave it out, she stopped moving on her spot and turned to sheriff. “And there’s something else.” Sheriff sighed, looked at Melissa. A thing in her voice made him uncomfortable and got ready for the worst. “Last night, he told me why he killed those teenagers.”

“Yeah, I know. I read the report” he said, taking a deep breath. “Glowing eyes.”

“We know a few kids that fit that description.” Sheriff nodded and then all of a sudden Rafael McCall’s voice echoed through the hallway, causing Stilinski and Mama McCall to turn their heads to that way.

“Listen up, everyone!” Agent said loudly. “The stolen ambulance has been spotted.” He took out his phone and read what was written. “Corner of Truman and Spaulding.”

Understanding where this was, sheriff looked at Melissa anxiously before started running towards the exit. “That’s three blocks from the school.” He quickly ran past the agent. “Let’s go. Go!”

Stella was putting her stuff back into her locker with a spaced-out expression on her face because of what happened back in the class few minutes ago when Aiden leaned against to the locker next to hers and started looking at her with a smirk on his handsome face.

Noticing him, she frowned and looked at him. “Oh, no” she started, taking a deep breath. She turned her whole body towards him, shaking her head, tightening her lips. “I don’t think so. There is no way in hell you come back here, after threatening one of my best friends not too long ago and two freaking weeks of nothing, with your cute little smile, the dark eyes, the brooding forehead, the muscles, and suddenly we are ripping each other’s clothes off in the Coach’s office.” Aiden was still grinning, hearing what Stella’s been telling him. She was trying to convince herself. But to be honest, she needed a distraction after the whole fly thing in the class and sadly, the only person who was that good to actually distract Stella was Aiden. She still didn’t trust him, she still thought about Boyd’s death when she looked at him but… After Jennifer and Deucalion… and after he almost died… They did talk and they did see each other but… In that moment, as her thoughts felt like a really tangled spaghetti, Stella knew she should’ve kicked him in the balls, turned around and walked away. “No way. It’s not going to happen.”

But, of course… she’s stopped thinking a while ago now.

They entered Coach’s office with her hands in Aiden’s hair, her lips on his and his hands on her bare skin. Her mind was so distracted that, let alone back to doing this, she even forgot what she did to Coach’s office with Stiles and Scott or Mischief Day.

Aiden lifted her up to put her on to the table but then he saw what happened. The desk, the chair, the board, everything with a screw in the making was on the ground in pieces. 

“Oh, God” Stella murmured as her hand slid down from Aiden’s chest to his muscled stomach. As they looked around, both of their hearts were pounding. “I totally forgot that we renovated the place.”

“Guidance Office?” Aiden asked, looking at her. Stella quickly nodded, bit her lip and grabbed his hand pulling him out of the office, closing the door behind them.

The minute they closed the door, Barrow took out his hospital bracelet and threw it onto table. The psychopath thought it was a great place to hide and do his little operation. He grabbed the middle-sized stapler off the ground and with his shaky hands, he used it to close the open wound on his stomach.

He squeezed every muscle not to scream, didn’t make a sound as he let out a sick chuckle.

“Wait a minute, wait a minute!” Stiles shouted out, walking after his father. As he caught up with his old man, his lips parted again, causing sheriff to curse himself for ever telling his son what was going on. Because now he knew Stiles was not going to let it go but it was too late for him to back down now. “The William Barrow? The Shrapnel Bomber? Spotted nearby?”

Sheriff stopped walking and as he lowered his voice talking, he looked at his son. “A little closer than nearby, actually” he explained to his son.

Then they heard Rafael’s voice, coming down from the stairs causing Stiles to look at him. “How do we get down to the basement?” A woman pointed them the direction, causing them to walk faster and kept talking. “I need to know where every entrance is. I don’t want anybody coming in or out of this school.”

Stiles looked at his father anxiously. “Dad, what’s really going on here?” he asked.

The only thing Sheriff did was to answer his son was to look around and look back at him with the same level of anxiousness.

Stella brushed her hair back with a smile, walking to her locker as she thought about the encounter that she had with Aiden not too long ago but as soon as she turned around the corner, she had to stop, seeing the guys in black suits. She frowned in confusion and then she saw Rafael McCall few yards away.

As she looked around, not knowing why those people were here, she noticed Stiles who was walking towards her but not seeing her. She frowned, stepping in front of him blocking his way and then quickly parting her lips. “Stiles!” she shouted, getting his attention. She watched his eyes move to her and then quickly continued. “What the hell is going on around here?”

Stiles didn’t stop, softly touched Stella’s elbow. “Come with me” he demanded in hurry.

She started walking alongside of Stiles, hearing him and his tone of voice. She was a lot more curious than before now. “What is going on?” she questioned again, walking near him. “Where are we going?”

“I’ll explain later” Stiles responded, walking fast. He looked at her from the corner of his eyes and continued. “But first we have to find the others. Come on.”

Stella nodded, started walking faster.

“Barrow went after kids with glowing eyes?” Isaac repeated in a question with a curious and surprised voice. They’ve found others few minutes later. Stiles told them what happened and why the cops and FBI were here and now they were thinking what’s their next move going to be. “He said those words exactly?”

“Yeah, and no one knows how he woke up from anesthesia” Stiles confirmed. “Just that when they opened him up, they found a tumor full of live flies…” Stella and Lydia stopped on their spot, hearing the word flies but no one seemed to notice for a while since they were walking behind them. “… which in any other circumstance would be all kinds of awesome.”

“Did you say flies?” Lydia asked, not even waiting for Stiles to finish his sentence. They all stopped, turning over to look at the two young girls.

Allison frowned worriedly. “Lydia?” She looked at her cousin next. “Stella, what’s wrong?”

As Lydia tightened his lips in fear, Stella sighed and started talking fast. “All day I have been hearing this sound” Stella said, knowing she was also talking for Lydia as well. “It’s like…” She looked around, trying to find the right word.

“It’s like this buzzing” Lydia completed Stella’s sentences, opening her green eyes.

“Like the sound of flies?” Allison asked, Stella nodded as she tightened her lips.

“Exactly like the sound of flies” Lydia confirmed her. Stiles’ eyes that were full of worry, moved between Stella and Lydia.

Stella quickly switched her whole body to look at Stiles in hurry. “Stilinski, we have to find Scott.”

They found Scott in front of the history class, listening to Kira and her dad’s conversation. Stiles almost slipped as he was trying to catch up with him. Apologized to the guy he bumped to and quickly walked over to Scott with Stella by his side. “Hey, dude, where the hell have you been?” he shouted at him. Scott’s eyes were questioning him as he was looking at the two of his friends.

Then Lydia joined them in hurry. “The police are leaving” she said quickly, causing Stella to look at her, her hair flipping in the air.

“What? Why?” she shouted. “Why are they leaving?”

As Lydia shook her head showing Stella that she doesn’t know, Scott was confused as hell a little bit more. “The police?” Scott asked, not knowing what was happening still.

“They must have cleared the building and grounds” Stiles murmured, not answering Scott’s question and looking at the two girls quickly. “Which means he’s not here.” Lydia closed her eyes shut, taking a deep breath in. Stella tightened her lips, turning them into a straight line as she shook her head in denial.

And Scott was looking at his friends in confusion. “Who? What are you guys-”

Stella quickly interrupted him, looking at Stiles. “He has to be here!” she shouted. She knew he was here. She was sure of it. “That sound…” She looked at Lydia, and then back to Stiles being surer of herself now more than ever. “The buzzing we’ve been hearing? It’s getting louder.”

Lydia gulped down, hearing the buzzing inside her brain getting louder and louder. Scott kept looking at his friends who were not bothered to tell him what’s going on. He still had no idea what was happening.

Stiles sighed, looked at the two girls. “How loud?” he asked but he didn’t need for those two to say something for him to get an answer. As soon as he looked at them, seeing their worried looks and flickering eyes, he got the answer. 

“Hey, dad. Dad!” Stiles quickly walked over to his father who were following the cops and the agents down the stairs to get out of the school. Sheriff looked at his son without stopping, telling him to continue with his eyes. “You can’t leave yet” Stiles said, walking fast behind his father.

Sheriff looked at his son who stopped at the last step looking at him. “We got an eyewitness that puts Barrow by the train station” he informed looking at Stiles. He knew why he was this worried and he was doing everything in his power to put an end to this as soon as possible.

“Let’s go, Stilinski!” Hearing Rafael’s voice, Sheriff turned to look at him and then kept walking with Stiles behind him once again, trying to stop his dad.

“Woah, woah, dad, please, just…” Sheriff stopped, looking at his son. Stiles took a deep breath. He knew his dad was still pretty suspicious about the whole thing, but he had to say it. “Lydia and Stella said that he is still here, in the school.”

Sheriff raised his eyebrows, quickly his eyes finding Stiles, lowering his voice. “Did they see him?”

“Not exactly, no” Stiles replied, pausing for a while. “Well, not at all actually. But they have a feeling.” His hands were joining the conversation, flipping through the air with the same heat as he was talking as usual in terms of hurry. “A supernatural feeling.” Sheriff raised up one eyebrow as his eyes found Lydia who was laying against one of the lockers, looking at the walls waiting for Stiles. Stella was with Scott at the time.

Sheriff looked back at his son, now knowing what to say but he was confused as hell. “Lydia wasn’t on the chessboard and Stella was not part of the supernatural” he reminded, frowning.

Stiles tightened his lips, tilting his head. “Well, they are now” Stiles said.

“Kanimas?”

“Um, banshees.”

“Oh, God” Sheriff said, rubbing his head. Yes, he might have been believing all this supernatural stuff now but still all these kinds of weird was confusing the hell out of him and he was wondering if these things were ever going to end.

“I know, I know how it sounds” Stiles started explaining. “But, basically, it means that they can sense when someone’s close to death.”

“Can they sense that I’m about to kill you?”

“I don’t know.” Sheriff and Stiles looked at Lydia at the same time. Young girl put a smile on her face and waved at them.

Sheriff waved back at her with a smile and then looked back at his son. “Alright, look, I’m not saying I don’t believe…” Sheriff started as he was walking backwards. “… but, right now, I’m going with eyewitness over Banshee.” Stiles shook his head, not agreeing with his father. “We’re leaving a few deputies here. School is on lockdown till 3:00.” Stiles tried to open his mouth to reject, pulling his hands up but sheriff didn’t let him speak as he was continuing to talk. “Nobody comes in, nobody goes out.” Sheriff opened his hands to both sides. “Buddy, that’s the best I’ve got right now. That’s the best I can give you, Stiles.”

Stiles was rapidly shaking his head to both sides. He parted his lips to speak with anxiety and fear combined. “You’re leaving me here, that’s not… That’s the worst!” he shouted after his father but Sheriff was already gone.

“You got it?” Scott asked as he was walking towards his mother with Stella by his side. They needed something from the hospital but the ins and outs were forbidden and with Stella performing her old skills, they got Melissa in with the thing they needed without any problem occurring whatsoever.

Melissa nodded, showing him the bag that she was holding. Scott reached for the bag, but he noticed Melissa’s worried looking moving on him and Stella. “Promise me, you’ll be careful.” Stella heard the worriedness in Melissa’s voice, got surprised. Her brown eyes found Melissa’s anxious ones. “I looked right in this guy’s eyes and it was terrifying.”

Scott nodded, blinking few times. “Yeah, okay, mom” he responded with a calm voice. He looked at Stella for a split second and then back to his mother. “We promise, okay?”

Melissa softly smiled, nodding looking back and forth between Scott and Stiles who was looking at her with a surprised expression. “Okay” she softly whispered, sighing in relief. She put one hand on Scott’s, the other on Stella’s shoulder and pulled them to herself into a warm and comforting hug. Stella frowned as she hugged her back. It was the first time something like that ever happened to her. Her conversations, interactions with her mother was mostly fights and arguments. She had no good memory of her in her mind and the ‘mother affection’ that she was getting from Melissa was something she never had from her own mother, it got her to surprise.

Melissa ended the hug, Scott grabbed the bag and nodded Stella ‘come on’ and then they left Melissa behind, getting worried for all of them every second. Melissa watched them until they took the left turn and she was no longer able to see them.

“Even though the cops searched the whole school…” Scott started, looking at Aiden, Ethan, Isaac and then at Stella. Isaac was listening to Scott with his arms crossed in front of his chest, standing right next to Stella who was standing between him and Ethan, his protective mode was on. And, however, Ethan was carefully listening to Scott, Aiden couldn’t help but look at Stella time to time, wondering if she was actually okay. “… Lydia and Stella…” Scott pointed Stella with a nod. “… think that he’s still here. But they didn’t have one thing.” Scott quickly opened the book, showing Barrow’s stuff to the werewolves around him. “Our sense of smell.” And then lifted his head up and looked at Stella. “And an Argent.”

Allison pulled up the window, looking outside. “The bestiary is literally over thousand pages, maybe more” she said, very focused. Her cousin was going to stay in school, help others search the grounds while she decided to sneak out and go home to look at the bestiary. And since the school was on lockdown, she was going to escape from the windows. She was as skilled as her cousin. “If I’m going to find anything about flies coming out of people’s bodies, it could take me all night.” She looked through the open window.

“And remember, the word in archaic Latin for fly is Musca” Lydia told her, helping out the Argent.

Allison put one leg out and nodded. “Got it” she said and climbed over the window and few seconds later, she was gone.

Lydia quickly turned to look at Stiles. “Where do we start?”

Stiles paused for a second and then looked back at her. “Upstairs.” Two of them looked at the clock. They had time until 3 PM. “We gotta go.”

“So, this is how it’s going to be now?” Isaac asked, rolling his eyes at the pairing Scott has made. Two werewolves were walking down in the dark hall, trying to catch a scent as Isaac looked at Scott from the corner of his eyes and continued. “We trust them?”

Scott looked around, parted his lips. “Just because I’m letting them help, doesn’t mean I trust them” Scott explained himself, but Isaac didn’t agree with him.

“Yeah, well, you let Stella go with them” he said, keep walking. He let out a soft scoff. “I don’t trust them, especially Aiden even that much. Or like them.” He stopped walking and after thinking about how to express his true feelings, he continued talking. “In fact, I hate them and just want them to die.”

“Well, if Barrow’s actually here and he’s got a plan, you might get what you want” the true alpha responded, walking again, taking the lead. This gave Isaac a smile, but Scott wasn’t done yet. He had another thought in his head. “But I don’t think Stella would like that.” Isaac’s smile turned to confusion. Seeing his expression, Scott stopped once again as he sighed and looked at Isaac to explain what he actually meant. “I don’t think she wants to live something like that one more time after that night, Isaac. She may be denying or trying to hide it but that doesn’t change the truth in her eyes.” He looked ahead. “That’s why I let her go with them. She kinda has this control over them and they kind of have control over her. She’d be safe with them.” He looked at Isaac. “Don’t tell me you haven’t noticed that.”

Isaac gave out a breath, moved his eyebrows up and down. Of course, he’s noticed but that didn’t make him hate Aiden and Ethan less. As they started walking again, he couldn’t help but murmur. “Even though it bothers me knowing my best friend likes a killer or even cares for one…” He let out a breath out of his nose. “I can’t really deny it.” He shook his head, continued in annoyance. “I hate it but I can’t deny it.”

“So…” Stella started, looking around and feeling the confidence that her gun was giving her. She would usually bring it to the school just to be safe but keep it in her car. After finding out that Barrow was in school, she sneaked out and got it without anyone seeing. She continued as she walked with the twins. She shrugged, looking at them. “Nothing yet?”

Even though Aiden looked at Stella, Ethan was the one who answered. “What are we? Tracking devices for the psychopaths?” he asked sarcastically. It’s been almost ten minutes since they’ve got down here, looking for Barrow but all they were catching was the chemicals; not Barrow.

“No, just dogs with highly advanced sense of smell” Stella responded sarcastically and then she pointed Aiden. “Look, dog number 1.” She pointed Ethan with a smile. “Dog number 2.” Stella found her joke very amusing while Aiden was fighting his urge to roll his eyes, Ethan didn’t even bother.

They kept walking, turning around the corner and right he was about to say something, he felt something and stopped. He quickly leaned against the wall, covering himself, causing them to stop walking in confusion.

“You got something?” Aiden asked curiously towards these mysterious acts of Ethan. _Dog number 2_ pulled up his hand, telling him to hold on for a sec. Stella held onto her gun tightly.

And then Ethan stepped out of the hiding spot, followed by Stella and Aiden but as they saw what was actually happening, Aiden and Stella started to laugh silently, covering their mouths with their hands to hide away their laughter. In the other hand, seeing Danny kissing the guy that he was talking in the yard today whose names was Stan, Ethan wasn’t that amused. He parted his lips in shock while Aiden and Stella were still behind him, chuckling with their mouths covered behind their hands.

Danny pulled away from the kiss, looking at Ethan. Now it was his turn to get surprised while Stella and Aiden stepped back hiding behind the wall, giving them their not-so privacy. As Stella leaned her back against the wall, they heard Ethan from far away. “Oh, really?” Aiden was still laughing as he was walking towards Stella.

“Hey, Stella” Stan whispered, knowing he was busted.

Stella tried to stop her chuckle but it was hard. She slightly nodded her head like Aiden and parted her lips. “Hey, Stan” she whispered back through her laughter and then with Aiden, she watched him walk past them. He nodded them goodbye. Stella hid her laughter, nodding goodbye back. Now they could hear Danny and Ethan talk but Stella and Aiden decided to give them a little break, not eavesdropping on their conversation.

Aiden turned to Stella with a smile on his face. Sensing the look on his face, her brown eyes moved to Aiden’s face from the ground. “What?” she questioned, tilting her head back to look at Aiden better. She could hear the chattering coming from Ethan and Danny, but she blocked them and focused on _Dog number 1_. “Aiden…” She let out a soft chuckle. “The way you’re looking at me… It’s…” She couldn’t complete her sentences, but Aiden parted his lips.

He shrugged before he talked. “Nothing” Aiden responded. “It’s just that…” He paused to think about what he could say and what he couldn’t in his mind. “You are, perhaps, the only one who saw the good in me. Kind of.” Stella found herself laughing, rolling her eyes. “You could barely see it… it was almost invisible. Even Ethan, my own brother wasn’t aware of that. Somewhere along the line… He kind of gave up… but you somehow didn’t.”

Stella softly laughed, remembered their previous conversations. “And you are the first one to tell me that” she responded, not even letting herself think about how she didn’t give up on him because he didn’t know that somehow… she just couldn’t. “I usually bring out the worst in people.”

Aiden chuckled lightly. “Actually, you know what? It may be true” he replied, making Stella laugh. But they have to straighten up as Ethan walked over to them rolling his eyes causing Stella and Aiden to laugh one more time.

This time, his answer was to look at his brother rolling his eyes at the young Argent. Because he knew exactly why he was laughing at him. “Ah, like you’re better than me” he argued in frustration.

Aiden tightened his lips together, trying to control his laughter and shrugged. But Stella’s smile froze on her face with the subject Ethan brought up in order to divert the conversation. She hated the way it was headed. But Aiden was highly calm. “At least, I didn’t see her kissing someone else, did I Ethan?” he asked, laughing.

“Yes, if you two dogs are done with whatever hell that you were doing, can we move on?” she said, pushing herself off the wall. She raised her eyebrows, waiting for them to move their asses. “Because there is a freaking shrapnel bomber who maimed and murmured few normal people to kill some glowing eyes which means your kind.” Her gaze moved on the twins. “So… I suggest you move your asses.” She saw the teasing flickers in Aiden’s eyes, trying so hard not to laugh. “No, Aiden! Not the right time or the place.” Ethan rolled his eyes and grimaced with the thought. “Okay, anyway, can we please move on? Okay? Good.”

And then without waiting for them, she started walking away.

Lydia stopped moving, looking around as she noticed something. She suddenly straightened up and looked at Stiles. “Scott and Isaac are in the basement, right?” she asked while Stiles was searching every bits of the art room. He straightened up, moving his eyes around and parted his lips as he answered her.

“Yeah,” he said, confirming the young girl. “With Stella, Ethan and Aiden. The plan is they meet in the middle…” He pulled a drawer open. “… in the boiler room.”

As Stiles kept looking around, something caught Lydia’s attention, the explosion pictures on the wall. With a thought that popped up in her mind, she lightly gasped. “All of the wolves and Stella” Lydia murmured, watching Stiles stand up and straightened his back. “All of the glowing eyes and one human are in the basement at the boiler room?”

Stiles thought about what Lydia said, one brow raised up and when he finally figured out what was happening, he quickly lifted his head up and looked at Lydia. “Oh, my God” he murmured. “An engineer could use a boiler room to blow up the whole school.”

“We have to get them out of there” Lydia heatedly responded.

“We have to get everyone out” Stiles said.

“How do we do that?” Lydia curiously questioned. Maybe werewolves could, somehow, get out and they could survive. Peter barely survived the Hale fire but Stella? She was human and an explosion would be her end.

And in that moment, she was all they think could about.

As they heard the fire alarm ringing through the school lot, they all stopped walking looking up with a reflex despite being in separate places. Stella looked at Aiden and Ethan. “What the hell?” she murmured, meanwhile Scott and Isaac were looking at each other in confusion and they all made their way to the stairs to get out of here, knowing something was wrong.

Stiles looked around, making sure everyone was getting out with his hand still on the fire alarm plug. Lydia was standing in front of him, doing what he was doing which was looking around and when she finally looked back at Stiles, her eyes opened widely with fear seeing the person behind him.

Meanwhile, Stiles was just looking at her with a victory smile.

But his smile froze on his face, making assumptions out of Lydia’s expression, knowing that he was in trouble. He turned around to see Coach, startled, let out a ‘wow’ and laid back as he let out a gasp and a sigh.

Coach grabbed Stiles’ ear, dragging him to the yard with Lydia following behind them. “Pulling a fire alarm on Mischief Night is one thing…” He slowed down his pace but didn’t stop, still dragging Stiles with him. “… Doing it when there’s a mass murderer spotted nearby is insane!” He stopped, let go off Stiles’ ear. His vain was showing with the heat he was talking in. He was straightly looking at Stiles. Lydia was waiting near them, worried about Stiles and the others. “If I was four years younger, I’d punch you!”

Stiles stepped back in confusion, his eyes on Coach. “What?” he asked, not understanding anything at all. “Coach, that doesn’t make sense.”

Coach opened his arms to side, shrugged and kept talking sarcastically. “Oh, well, it does to me!” As he left them alone Stiles paused, looked around like he didn’t want to deal with his bullshit. But then when he finally saw the people he was looking for, he grabbed Lydia by the hand, pointed her the direction with his head.

“There” he said as they started walking towards them. At the same time, he was rubbing his burning ear in pain that Coach grabbed.

Stella was the first one to notice those two as she was standing right next to Aiden in blue shirt, but Aiden was the one who started speaking. “We didn’t find anything” he said speedily as he was looking at Stiles.

“Not even a scent” Scott continued.

“Well, we found Danny and Stan kissing in the basement” Stella said, trying to annoy Ethan. She put her hand on his shoulder with an act of fake support, formed up a fake sincere expression on her face. “Who were so close to being an item if you ask me. Maybe you shouldn’t have dropped out just for the math and lose Danny. I was honestly rooting for you two.”

Ethan rolled his eyes, shook his shoulder to get rid of Stella’s hand causing Stella to laugh up her sleeve. “Yeah, thank you so much Stella” Ethan said, annoyed. Stella nodded him you’re welcome.

“It’s 3:00, so, school’s over” Stiles said, ending their joking argument. “If there was a bomb, wouldn’t he have set it off by now?”

“Does that mean everybody’s safe?” Aiden asked curiously, looking between the people around him.

“I don’t know” Lydia responded when she felt everyone was looking at her. “I just… I don’t know.”

All the eyes on Lydia was now on Stella, causing her to open her hands as she looked back at them in disbelief. “I’ve not been a banshee longer than Lydia, guys” he ranted, looking at them. She let out a sharp breath. “My answer is the same…” She sighed, continued. “I don’t know.”

Seeing Coach, she took her headphones out and closed the book she was reading. Then she realized the fire alarm was on. Kira turned to look at Coach who was looking at her in disbelief and exhaustion in his eyes. “How loud are you playing that thing?” he asked curiously. She stood up quickly, Coach kept yelling. “Let’s go! Get the hell out of here!” As Kira nodded and made her way to the exit, Coach followed her.

And the thing that no one noticed was the fact that Barrow was in the library, watching them go.

Derek put the claws back into the box while Peter was tapping on the table with his finger within a rhythm. Then he stopped, parted his lips in a second, looking at Derek. “You know, there’s always an element of danger to rituals like this” he told him, mostly concerned about himself. “I’m not particularly fond of them.” Derek was looking at his uncle with an empty expression as he put another claw back into the box, not caring about his uncle for a bit. Peter continued. “Unless they somehow benefit me.”

Derek scoffed, annoyed. “What do you want?”

“I want to keep them” Peter answered and then continued when Derek’s eyes were on him, questioning his motive. “Sentimental value.” Derek raised his eyebrows in disbelief. “She was your mother, but she was also my sister?” Derek’s eyebrows raised up a little bit higher. “What?” he said defensively. “Am I not allowed a little bit of sentiment?” Derek smiled, his expression was almost as like he was telling him to stop being ridiculous and he didn’t believe him at all.

He tilted his head, put another claw in.

When all the claws were in the little wooden box, Derek put it in front of Peter. He smiled, looked at Derek and as he shrugged, he looked ahead at the box, sighed. He tried to get himself ready for to put his hand in it. Derek stood up, walked around a bit. He was standing near Peter, acting like a guardian of him with his arms crossed in front of his chest. Peter’s hand formed up a fist, taking a deep breath in and giving it back. He side-eyed Derek but seeing his scowl, he turned back to what he was supposed to do. His hand started to into the box, but it was slow.

A lot slower than Derek ever wanted it to be. He rolled his eyes. “Too long!” He grabbed Peter’s hand and ignoring his screams at him, telling him stop, he forced his hand to dive into the box, his fingers met with Thalia’s claws causing Peter to squirm in pain and his eyes glowing blue.

“Hey, guys!” As Scott and Stella heard their history teacher Mr. Yukimura’s voice, they quickly stopped on their spot and turned to look at him, watching him walk towards them. He was carrying a big sincere smile, causing Stella to smile but also slightly frown in curiosity. She put her phone in her back pocket as her and Scott shared a confused look.

“Mr. Yukimura?” Stella said as Ken Yukimura stood in front of them. “Is everything okay?”

“Yes, Stella, yes, everything is alright” Ken assured them with a smile. He softly nodded at Scott, pointing him. “I just realized I forgot to thank you Scott for saving my daughter from that coyote, so…” He smiled more like it was possible and tilted his head gratefully. “… thank you.”

Scott smiled back. “It’s nothing, Mr. Yukimura, really” McCall said kindly. 

“No, no, I want to invite you to dinner tonight as a thank you” Mr. Yukimura continued, still smiling positively. Stella and Scott were surprised with the situation and as they were looking each other, Stella felt her buzzing phone, telling her that there was a new message.

As Scott and Mr. Yukimura kept talking, Stella could hear the chattering, but she grabbed her phone and looked at the text.

**Ariel – Hey, I’m with Stiles heading to his house. Allison said she is still looking but so far nada. Isaac is going to help her. I know you are with Scott so let’s keep each other posted.**

Stella typed her an approval message, but as she hit send, she noticed Scott and Mr. Yukimura were looking at her. She lifted her head up, looked at the alpha. She thought about what could be bothering him but then she thought about what they were talking about before Mr. Yukimura walked up to them. It helped her a lot, knowing what was happening. “Yeah, you can go” Stella said quickly. “Don’t worry about me.”

“Are you sure?” Scott asked, giving her a puppy face.

Stella softly smiled. “Yes, Scott, I’m sure. Go, please. I mean…” She shrugged. “Lydia is with Stiles; Isaac is on his way to help Allison out and I can take care of myself. If something happens, you’d be the first one to know.”

Scott was still not comfortable about leaving Stella alone and Mr. Yukimura misunderstood everything as he looked at Stella. “You are invited too, Stella.”

Stella first frowned and then she smiled to reject his invitation kindly. “Ah… I’ve promised my dad I’ll see him tonight” she said, confusing Scott. She knew the reason, but she ignored him, trying not to roll her eyes, and continued. “Maybe next time.” Mr. Yukimura nodded as he said nothing about her reasons because he didn’t know about her father like everyone else. “But Scott would be honored to join you tonight.”

“Alright, then.” Mr. Yukimura turned to look at Scott. “I know you don’t know where we live, so, I’ll be in the parking lot. See you there.” Scott nodded and as Mr. Yukimura walked away, leaving them alone to talk, Scott quickly looked at Stella.

“Your dad?” he asked, confused. “I thought you didn’t know your dad.”

Stella rolled her eyes. “And I thought you were smarter than that” she reacted, shaking her head in disbelief. “I don’t know my dad, McCall. I just got some help from a topic that no one dares to ask me instead of saying ‘ _Hey, sorry, going to my teacher’s house and have a chat with their daughter that I don’t really like while eating is not something I do_ ’ like a dick. It’s called manners and courtesy, Wolfy. Look it up.” Scott kept his gaze in disbelief with a soft chuckle. When Stella noticed he was still not moving, she rolled her eyes and pushed Scott by his shoulder. “Scott, go!”

“What are you gonna do if he is not at home?” he asked after getting his balance back, taking few steps towards the parking lot where Mr. Yukimura was waiting for him but looking at Stella.

Stella took a deep breath and sighed as he continued. “Then, I’m gonna try to find him” she responded, sure of herself and the plan. “I haven’t heard from Derek for almost two weeks and it’s making me nervous.” She pressed her lips into a smile. “You go” she murmured. “I’ll be fine.”

Scott nodded and then started walking away, leaving Stella alone.

Lydia was laying on her stomach on Stiles’ bed, looking at the board he was using to solve mysterious. It had Barrow’s picture, there was a red string tied to it, stretching to the photo of their school. Her green eyes were moving on the board, looking at the colored strings. There were green, yellow, blue and red ones on there. “What do the different colored strings mean?” she curiously asked.

Stiles stopped whatever that he was doing for a few seconds, he looked at the young girl and then back to the board as he explained. “Uh, just different stages of the investigation.” He put his hand on the table, grabbing it by the edge as he looked back at Lydia, continued. “So, green is solved; yellow is to be determined.” He shrugged, looked at the board. “Blue’s just pretty.”

“What does red mean?” Lydia asked as a follow up question.

“Unsolved.”

“You only have red on the board” Lydia stated the situation, Stiles sighed in exhaustion and tedium.

“Yes, I’m aware” he said, not liking the facts but knowing them well. “Thank you.”

Lydia sighed, pulling the string around her fingers as she parted her lips. “Did you get detention for pulling the alarm?” she asked, feeling responsible for what Stiles did. Her voice came out sadder than she intended to. She was blaming herself for putting Stiles in trouble.

“Yep” Stiles answered, taking his hand to his chin as he kept looking at the board focused as laser. “Every day this week.” He turned his upper body to look at Lydia. “It’s okay, though. We were onto something.”

As he looked back to the board, Lydia sighed. “Even though we couldn’t find any proof of Barrow being there?”

Something in Lydia’s voice bothered Stiles. He turned around to look at her, only to see her playing with the string she was holding, sad and defeated. “Hey, Lydia.” He walked over to her, kneeled in front of her and looked into those green eyes that he adored. “You girls have been right… you’ve been right every time something like this has happened, okay?” Lydia leaned into her back to look at Stiles. “So, don’t start doubting yourself now.”

“No scent.” She paused for a second. “No bomb.” Her green eyes found the strangled red string between her fingers, she took a deep breath, gave it out. “And I got you in trouble.”

Stiles reached for her hand and started to untangle the strings as he parted his lips. “Okay, okay, look” he said with a calming voice. “Barrow was there, alright? You knew it. You felt it, okay? And you weren’t alone on that.” Lydia’s eyes were widened up with the things she was feeling, and effect of the things Stiles was telling her. She was looking at him, surprised, shocked. “And look, if you wanted to…” He untangled the strings around Lydia’s finger, throwing it aside and continued. “… I’d go back to that school right now and search all night just to prove it.” Lydia smiled, avoiding eye contact with Stiles who picked up his yellow highlight pen. But then he noticed something. As he accidentally took it to his nose and smelt it, he suddenly straightened up, thinking about something. Lydia saw the change in his mood, started looking at him with confusion. Then Stiles quickly stood up. “Get up. Get up now. We’re going to the school.”

It was closing to 7 PM and she was still looking at the Latin passages on the screen, trying to find something but so far, it was nothing. Her hands were moving on the keyboard when she heard something, a noise. Her fingers paused on the mouse and the keyboard as she listened carefully. She slowly rose up from her seat on alert but then she heard the electrocution noise which was followed by a painful moan.

The minute she figured out who it was, a grin formed up on her face. She sat down on her seat, looked back at the screen. Isaac walked in, leaning against the door with his gaze on Allison who was sitting behind the computer. “Electrified the windows?” he questioned in disbelief.

“Yep” she responded without any emotion showing. She lifted her head up, looked at him and shrugged. As she continued, she looked back at the screen. “Stella’s idea.”

“Didn’t wanna say anything about it?”

“Nope” she replied with the same tone, popping the ‘p’ sound. Her eyes found Isaac again. “My idea.” She looked back at the computer screen again, trying to hold back her smile.

“Okay” Isaac murmured, walking over the table towards Allison.

“What are you doing here?” she asked calmly, not looking away from the computer screen.

“I figured you could use an extra pair of eyes” Isaac replied as he walked over to Allison and put one hand on the back of the chair Allison was sitting on. “Stiles and Lydia are together. I have no idea what Scott is doing. Stella was going to check up on Derek. I came to help.”

Young girl sighed as she leaned back. Her tired brown eyes were still on the screen reading the passages. “Can you read Latin?” she asked.

“No” Isaac responded without waiting. He didn’t need to think to answer this question. “But I can look at the pictures.” Allison looked at him, trying to understand if he was serious and then waved her hand in the air, telling him to go for it. She scrolled her chair back, giving Isaac room to work on.

Isaac skipped to the next page.

The smile on his face froze as he saw the picture of a terrifying red image of a skull with black eyes… The picture that looked like a demon caused Allison and Isaac to look at each other in worry as they were thinking about how screwed up that they are. 

“So, what are we looking for?” Lydia asked curiously. As Stiles dragged her to school in the middle of the night, he didn’t give her any explanation. And he didn’t explain anything again as he pushed the Chem Lab’s door open, causing Lydia to startle, gasp softly and frown. “That was supposed to be locked.”

“Yeah, I know” Stiles responded. He quickly grabbed his phone in his pocket. “Notice anything else?”

Lydia took a sniff and as she gave her breath out, she let out a soft ‘ha’ noticing the smell. “It smells like chemicals.” Stiles opened the flash in his phone, kneeled and started to look at the bottles. Meanwhile, Lydia pushed herself from the wall walking up and down in the lab. “They wouldn’t have been able to catch his scent.”

Stiles nodded but then something on the floor caught his attention. Blood and stables… He sighed. “He was here” he announced, couldn’t help his voice to come out as a murmur. “He was performing very minor surgery on himself.” He turned his head to look at Lydia who still looked a little surprised. “You and Stella were right.”

“Then why don’t I feel good about this?” Lydia questioned.

“Probably because he was here to kill somebody” Stiles answered.

“Bu who?”

As Lydia pressed her lips together, her green gaze moved to Stiles in fear and curiosity, causing him to part his lips and answer the young girl. “That’s what we gotta figure out.” He stood up, took few steps ahead, placed his phone back to his pocket. “We could spread out, start looking for anything.” As Stiles headed for the lockers, he suddenly noticed that Lydia was walking towards the board which caused him to frown in confusion. “Lydia, what are those?” he asked, seeing the writings on the boar. There were numbers.

“Atomic numbers” Lydia answered, frowning her brows as she was trying to figure out what was the reason behind them.

Stiles quickly walked up to her. “Is it a formula?”

“Not really” Lydia said, her green eyes are on the board. “19’s potassium, 53’s iodine and 88’s radium. The first two make potassium iodide.” She grabbed a white chalk, put the letter K next to the number 19. As she wrote I next to 53, Stiles frowned looking at the letter Lydia was writing on the board.

“Potassium is K?”

“From kalium” Lydia explained. “The scientific neo-Latin name.”

“What is radium?” The minute Stiles understood what’s happening, she gave out a deep breath between his lips. The name he was thinking was half written on the board and it meant nothing but bad.

Lydia wrote Ra next to 88. “Ra.”

“Kira.”

“Were you able to reach Stella?” Isaac asked as he walked around and looked at Allison who was sitting on the bed with piles of papers around her. She nodded, confirming him but since she was focused on the papers that she was holding which could have had some information about the things she was looking for, she didn’t say anything else which made Isaac to continue with his questions. “So? Did she know or find anything?”

“She thinks that we should be looking for something else and then said even if she knows something about flies, she wouldn’t worry that much and then she hung up on me” Allison responded with a smile as she lifted her head up to look at Isaac who was laughing as rolling his eyes thinking about Stella saying those things. Allison continued, picking up a piece of paper from the bed. “But there’s a reference about flies being able to carry messages to the dead.” Isaac frowned, sitting behind Allison on the bed. “What about you? Did you find anything?” she asked, turning her body to look at Isaac over her shoulder.

Isaac leaned over Allison to point the papers in front of her. “Uh, just Beelzebub, the Lord of the Flies.” Allison turned her head more to Isaac, which she was questioning the reason why she did that. Isaac took it as something else and leaned forward towards her.

Understanding what he was trying to do, Allison pulled herself back, but she was carrying a little smile. “Are you serious?” she asked in disbelief that almost sounded fake. Isaac didn’t understand, looking at her face blankly. Allison raised an eyebrow in shock. “You were just trying to kiss me.”

Isaac smiled. “No, I wasn’t.”

“Then what were you trying to do?” Allison asked. “Head-butt me?”

“Alright, maybe I was trying to kiss you” Isaac responded with a smile. Allison didn’t know what to do or say for a second and then she speedily got up, turning around and looked at Isaac in a fake disbelief that could be sensed from anyone.

“Are you completely, totally out of your mind?” Isaac was looking at the young girl who was in an argument with herself in her brain. She brushed her hair back. “You actually think that I would want to kiss you. Or... or any other werewolf again? Because trust me on this, I would never kiss you. Ever.”

Meanwhile, she knew she had some feelings for Isaac, but she never wanted to show them to him. But again, she wasn’t Stella. She was giving into her emotions; she wasn’t scared like the way Stella usually was. She wasn’t that good; she was always trying to hide them hence the situation she was in now. In the other hand, Allison was a lot different than her in this one. She didn’t like it, showing emotions like that but despite her cousin, she was never bad with any sort of emotion at all. She was used to it.

“Never?” Isaac asked, shaking his head slightly. “Okay. Alright, fine.” He stood up and making Allison gasp, he took off his shirt leaving himself half naked, standing without a top. “I won’t kiss you either.”

Seeing the bet, Allison took off her shirt as well. She was across Isaac, just with her grey bra when her door opened suddenly, causing both of them to gasp and look at the door.

“Allison, do you know where Stella-” Argent gave out a sharp breath from his nose angrily as he saw what was happening, the minute he stepped into his daughter’s room. Allison and Isaac quickly put on their shirts back, Chris parted his lips still angry as hell. “Allison. Can I see you in my office?” His threatening eyes found Isaac. “Where I keep my guns…” As Allison left the room, following her dad, Isaac murmured a silent ‘shit’ and then Chris’ angry voice filled up and echoed through the whole apartment. “ANOTHER WEREWOLF?!”

“What the hell?” Stella murmured as she slid the door close behind her and went down the tiny stairs. Derek was sitting on a chair backwards and Peter’s claws were on the back of his neck. Young Argent knew it would be dangerous to break the bond between them, it could kill them both, but she felt like she needed to do something. She took a deep breath, her eyes moved around in the room, stopping on the brown wooden box left on the couch. She frowned, not knowing what that was but decided to ignore it and turned her head to look back at Derek and Peter.

She took a deep breath, crossing her arms in front of her chest as she thought about what she could do. She could hop into Derek’s brain like she did with her friends when they were trying to find where Nemeton was, but she knew he wouldn’t want that. The way he was sitting on the chair gave Stella the idea that this whole thing was intentional. Which was one of the things that Stella was curious about. What they were doing and why they were doing that for?

And then suddenly Peter pulled the claws to himself with a gasp, not seeing Stella just yet. The claws were funny on Peter, it was almost like they didn’t belong to him. He quickly turned to Derek who was covered in sweat, panting. “Did you see her? What did you ask her? Did she say anything about me?” Peter asked back to back, curiously and heatedly. Stella frowned deeper, looking at Peter. He noticed her at the same time but couldn’t ask her what she was doing her when Derek looked at him with a scowl and angry look. He was breathing heavily. His whole face was covered with sweats. “Well, that doesn’t look good” he commented. 

“No, it doesn’t!” she agreed, shouting a little bit as her eyes moved on Peter and Derek, waving her hands up in the air, trying to get their attention on herself. And then she continued when Derek and Peter turned their heads to look at her. “Okay, now that I got your attention… are any of you planning to tell me what the hell were you trying to do as the dumbasses that you are?”

First one to respond to her was Peter with the same attitude. “Alright, are you going to explain us why you are here?” he asked, exhausted.

Stella chuckled like it was so obvious. She took a breath in and out. “I came here to talk to Derek” she started explaining. She looked at Derek. “No one heard from you after you texted me that you were coming back to Beacon Hills. I came here to check up on the loft few weeks back but there was nothing, nada.” She raised her eyebrows, looking at them both. “Anyone wanna explain why Calaveras took you? What did they want?”

Peter and Derek frowned, shared a look and then both of their eyes found Stella who was highly confused as they all were right now. “Taken?” Peter asked, surprised. As he saw the way Stella was looking at them, he continued. “We were not taken.” He let out a sharp breath, dropped his shoulders. “Okay, we were taken but nobody _came here to_ took us. We just added Mexico to our South America tour because this one here…” He pointed Derek with his head. “… wanted to talk to Talia and then we got trapped.”

“Talia?” she repeated. “Your dead relative? Your mother, to be exact?”

“Yes, long story” Derek said, closing the topic but then he remembered something else. He frowned. “How do you know about the Calaveras?”

Stella ignored his question. “What do you mean no one came here?” Stella asked, raising her voice. She found a bullet here, it belonged Calaveras. What now? Araya came here, apart from her hunters and then left? It didn’t make any sense. Stella felt the shiver all throughout her whole body. “Derek’s… Derek’s car was here.”

“Because we drove with Peter’s car” Derek answered. He was more of himself now, the sweat was gone. His hair was still wet, but his heart beatings were normal. He was still sitting on the chair backwards, though.

Stella raised her brows in disbelief. “You own a car?” he questioned. Peter rolled his eyes and then confirmed her with a nod. Stella felt her phone buzzing in her back pocket and even though, her hand was making its way to grab it, her focus was only on Peter and Derek listening to them.

“I don’t use it much, but you haven’t answered the question” Peter said, determined. He took a step forward Stella which caused her to step back automatically. “How do you know about the Calaveras?”

“I, uh… I found a bullet on the ground last week, when I was in the loft” Stella responded to the werewolf who was looking at her, confused. Her voice started to shake because something was off. But she kept talking anyway. “It had a skull carve on it. It’s-It’s their symbol. I…”

“Are you sure you that you found a bullet?” Derek asked, knowing that Calaveras never came here and with that question, Stella parted her shaky lips. Then she actually remembered what happened that day.

“Oh, my God” she murmured, high level of terror in her voice. As the memories came flooding to her mind, she gave out a sharp breath out of her parted lips.

_**** As she left Stiles with Scott to take care of him because of the panic attack he had, she hopped on a taxi to go to Derek’s loft. Since her car was still a wreck and probably keep being one, right now her transportation was this little yellow vehicle._

_As she arrived at the place she wanted to, she went upstairs, she tried to slide open the door, but it did not open. It was closed, locked. She smiled, taking out a bobby pin from her hair and as she was so used to it, she kneeled down in front of the door and picked up the lock. Few seconds later, the door slid open only for Stella to see the fact that it was empty. She walked to the middle of the room, stopped. She looked around, kneeled down and then she sighed with her phone ringing in her pocket. ****_

There was never a bullet. There was never anything. It was a trick that her brain played her at the time. The door in her mind was still open and what Deaton told her was slowly happening; if it were to keep going like that, she was gonna have some troubles seeing what was real and what was not.

Her shaky lips opened widely, letting out a loud banshee scream. As she screamed loudly, Derek and Peter quickly closed their ears.

“Thanks for dinner” Scott said, looking at the Kira who was walking him out to his bike with a huge smile on her face that she couldn’t wipe away.

Kira chuckled. “For the sushi or the pizza?” Scott thought about the taste of the wasabi and how he couldn’t eat anything from the food that was served tonight which ended up with them ordering pizza and coke.

Scott pretended to be thinking, making Kira giggle. “Uh, the Pizza was good” he said at last. They reached Scott’s bike as they were both laughing joyfully.

“You seem like a really nice guy” Kira said, nervously playing with her hands. Scott walked around the bike, standing on the other side putting the bike between them. He looked at her with a smile. “And not just because you kept me from getting eaten by a coyote.”

Scott got on his bike and shrugged humbly. “Did I do something?”

“Yeah” she said, still playing with her fingers but her eyes were on Scott. “You remembered my name.” As they were both smiling, looking at each other, none of them knew what was about to happen. Because at that time, Barrow walked behind Scott, hit his head with a metal stick and knocked the young man out cold.

“Scott! Scott? Scott!” Stiles’ voice was blurry, reaching to Scott like he was shouting at him from the end of a tunnel. Scott tried to get to himself as he saw Stiles and Lydia who were looking at him with worry and hurry in their eyes.

He stood up, looked around and his eyes found Stiles and Lydia with heavy breathings. “Barrow… he took Kira!”

“We know” Stiles said. “He was after her the whole time.”

“No, nothing” Isaac said to Scott on the phone as he was looking through the papers in front of him. “Just stuff about flies and the dead. Nothing else.”

“Alright, thanks.” Scott hung up the phone and walked over to Stiles and Lydia. “We have to think of something. He is going to kill her.” He took a deep breath and looked at Stiles. “Did you text Stella? She was supposed to go to the loft, but we will need her help.” Stiles nodded, quickly reaching out for his phone as Lydia parted her lips to speak.

“We knew he was there” Lydia said, questioning everything that happened today. She looked at Scott and then Stiles who was texting Stella at the time. “How did we know that?”

Stiles hit send and shoved his phone back to his pocket, looking at the young girl. “Because you heard the flies, right?” Stiles asked, trying to understand it just like she was.

Scott quickly turned to look at the young girl. “What do you hear now?” he asked. All they had was Lydia right now, but Scott trusted her enough to know that she could do it on her own. Besides, she was their only shot at finding Kira right now.

Lydia paused for a while, tried to listen but there was radio silent. “Nothing.” She looked up from the asphalt back to two boys across her. “I feel like I can do this, but I don’t know what to do.” Young Martin shook her head to both sides. “It’s like it’s on the tip of my tongue, and I don’t know how to trigger it. I just…” Her hands went through her strawberry blonde hair. “I swear to God, it literally makes me want to scream.”

“Okay, then scream” Stiles said, taking a step forward Lydia. “Lydia, scream.”

And as they both closed their ears with their hands, Lydia screamed with everything she got, dropping her arms to her sides.

Stella pressed her lips together, tears in her eyes. She opened them back on, looking at Derek and Peter who was looking back at her with worry and confusion in their eyes. Stella lifted her head up, leaning it back to look at the fluorescent and then she realized.

She wasn’t hearing flies anymore. It was the sound of electricity.

Stiles looked at Scott who was standing few steps behind of him with a ‘dude, that was loud’ expression and then as he looked back at Lydia, the only thing she was hearing was the electricity. Young girl first came to herself, looked at Scott and Stiles over her shoulder and then looked ahead. The sound of the electricity was echoing through her ears, she lifted her head up at the streetlight. “It’s not flies” she murmured. She speedily turned around, startling Stiles causing him to step back but Lydia didn’t care. She had a smile on with the thought of she finally had something figured out before something else happened. She continued with the same smile. “It’s electricity.”

“Wait a second, Barrow was an electrical engineer” Stiles said, Scott was looking at the streetlight. “He worked at a power substation.”

Scott quickly looked at Stiles. “What substation?”

Young girl was frightened as heck, looking at Barrow who was rubbing the cable to iron creating deathly sparkles. She was tied up, nowhere to go. “What are you doing?” she asked, horror in her voice and tears in her eyes. His voice came out shaky due to how scared she was.

Barrow stopped whatever that he was doing. “Right now?” he asked, kneeling near Kira who was trying to pull herself away but due to being tied up, she failed. “Ah, right now, I’m gonna take your picture.” He grabbed Kira’s phone from her pocket, opened the camera and then turned on the flash. “Hmm. Just a little proof of our time here together.” He fixed up the camera’s light. “A little proof for all of those people who never believed.”

He closed in with the picture and took it.

“Okay, you got your picture” Kira shakily said, trying to control her voice, trying to be cool and strong. “You want to let me go now?” Kira was pulling herself, her hands, trying to get herself free but Barrow laughed sarcastically, shaking his head rejecting young girl’s wish.

“Oh, did you ever see a movie called Village of the Damned?” Barrow asked. “The original. Not the remake. Nobody cares about the crappy remakes.” He took a quick breath in. “I’m talking about the 1960 black-and-white masterpiece. Huh? It’s about this group of children. Blonde-haired…” His hand reached out to Kira’s cheek, but she tried to pull herself back with fear, shaking her head. Barrow continued. “… Beautiful children who can make their eyes glow.” He shook his head. “And they do terrible, terrible things. Tag line on the poster read, ‘Beware the stare that will paralyze the will of the world’. Now, when I told everyone that I saw children with glowing eyes, they wouldn’t believe me!” As he raised his voice all of a sudden, Kira startled. He stood up, walked around. “I tried to get them to do something.” He shook his head, looked at Kira. “But they wouldn’t budge. They wouldn’t move a muscle.” He shrugged, he paused but not for long. “As if they had been paralyzed.” Kira was breathing heavily, shallowly. “I’m going to get them moving. I’m going to…” He kneeled, grabbed the cable. Kira tried to free herself again but failed. “I am going to galvanize them.”

Scott hoped off from his bike, while Stella and Stiles climbed out of the vehicles they were using. The young Argent walked toward Scott with fast and quick steps. She got and read Stiles’ text after she grabbed the keys from Derek’s car. She knew where Barrow used to work, that’s why she knew where to go next from the loft.

Scott and Stella came eye to eye with Stiles, letting him know they were going in first and then both ran towards the building where Barrow used to work. Meanwhile Stiles looked at Lydia who was taking off her seatbelt. “Okay. Wait here, alright?” Stiles told her. “Just wait for cops to come.”

Lydia’s confused and shocked green eyes found Stiles. “Me?” she repeated, Stiles closed the door behind him and walked over to Lydia’s side outside the car. “Wait, why?”

Stiles pulled up his bat in the air. “I only got one bat.”

As Stiles and Scott were walking towards the source of the voice, Stella’s hand was on her gun which was tucked in between her belt and skin. “Scott!” First one to hear Kira’s voice was the young true Alpha. He started running towards the young girl, meanwhile Stella was looking around stopping on her spot. She was also the first one who noticed Barrow after Kira. “No!”

“Scott! Look out!” Stella shouted when she saw Barrow standing behind Scott with a large electric cable in his hands. Barrow swiped the cable, hitting Scott and throwing him to the fences ahead. Stella took few breaths in and out, looking at Kira for a second and then thought about their new code. _We protect those who cannot protect themselves._

Seeing her eyes, Scott knew what Stella was thinking. He shouted. “Stella, don’t!” Even though she heard Scott shouting her name, telling her not to do what she was about to do, she ignored him and looked at Barrow who was walking towards her. As he got ready to do the same thing to Stella like what he did to Scott, Stella got in her position. But all of a sudden, she was distracted with a wolf howl. The wolf who appeared behind Kira caused Stella to be thrown across the room like Scott but probably in a more painful way. Stella fell on the ground with an amazing pain radiating throughout her body. “Stella!” Stella could think, she was conscious. But she was feeling a little dizzy, she didn’t have the strength to move. She could see Barrow changed his route to Kira once again. Scott noticed that as well. “Don’t!” He shouted, this time for Kira. “She is not- She’s not the one you want!” Scott was squeezing every muscle on his body because of the electrocution he endured on his body. His worried brown eyes were moving back and forth between Kira and Stella who was still on the floor and not moving.

He couldn’t, he wouldn’t let neither Kira nor Stella get hurt.

Barrow looked at Scott for a short period of time but then his eyes found Kira once again. The cable that was producing electric like crazy was getting closer and closer to Kira every second because Barrow was walking towards her. “No” Kira murmured with fear.

“Don’t!” Hearing Stella’s voice, even if it came out weak, relaxed Scott down for even a while but his eyes were still on Kira which was about to be Barrow’s next victim. His hand was holding Kira’s black hair tightly. “Stop! No!”

As Stella’s worry, helpless and fearful voice echoed through the room, the cable in Barrow’s hand touched Kira and then a big explosion occurred. Stella and Scott had to use every strength left in them to cover their faces from the electrocution and the blue lightning that filled up the room. Stella looked between the gap, wondering what the source was. She straightened up, getting support from her arms.

And all she saw was Kira, not harmed, still breathing between all lightnings. All of the blue-white sparkles were flooding towards Kira’s hands.

Stella’s lips fell apart in shock. She was sure of two things. Firstly, Kira wasn’t in danger. Barrow was laying on the ground, burned and dead. And secondly, Kira wasn’t just a human. She was part of the supernatural world. She had no idea what it was, but judging by the look on Kira’s face, Stella wasn’t alone in this either.

Kira was as surprised as all of them.

The sparkle went away, Scott and Stella shared a concerned look. Then Scott stood up, his eyes were on Kira not leaving her and he looked pretty surprised, knowing she was the only reason why now all the town was having a black out. The power was gone.

Scott ran towards Stella when he came to.

As Isaac was going through the pages he was holding once again trying to find something out of them and pacing around the room, the lights started to flicker and then went out suddenly. He lifted his head up to look at the lamb. He frowned with the sudden darkness and looked at the window.

He felt something behind him, he turned around but there was nothing. Then he felt the same thing on his left but still. Nothing. He was hearing voices and then he saw them. A black, ninja-like creature in front of him. He felt the fear rising inside him, he looked around, only to see more of them surrounding him.

They were everywhere.

The ninja-like, masked guys started walking around Isaac until they were all in straight line in front of him. Even with the fear he was feeling, he heard the door closing shot with an invisible force.

He wasn’t the only one.

Allison and Chris walked out of his study next door in confusion, made their way to in front of Allison’s room. As they heard the fighting sounds inside, they started to knock on the door rapidly, trying to open it but it wasn’t working. The door wouldn’t open. “Isaac!” They started to scream, shout, keep knocking on the door. “Isaac! Isaac, come on, open the door!”

“Isaac! Isaac!”

“Isaac, open up!”


	16. ILLUMINATED

As soon as the door opened by itself and the invisible force that was keeping the door closed was gone, Chris and Allison ran towards Isaac who was shivering from cold on the ground, near the bed. “Isaac!” Allison’s hands found his face, trying to turn it towards her, trying to get Isaac to look at her but he was too strong, he was fighting it. She didn’t care. There was only one thing she cared about. “He’s freezing. Dad, he’s like ice.” Her hand went through Isaac’s hair, Chris grabbed him by the chin and forcefully turned his face towards him.

“Isaac, look at me! Isaac!” he shouted.

“What’s happening to him?” Allison asked, worried about him. Her brown eyes were on her father, glowing with anxiousness.

“Isaac, come on.” Chris didn’t answer his daughter’s question, trying to get Isaac back to himself. His full attention was on Isaac, trying to get him to turn. “Isaac, listen, you have to turn.” Young man was still shivering, still cold as ice. “Look at me!” Chris punched his face the way he wanted to ever since he walked in on him with his daughter but with totally different purposes this time. “You need to trigger it.” He kept talking as he kept punching. “Come on. Turn!” He punched him one more time. “Turn! Turn!”

Isaac glowed his amber colored eyes and looked at Chris who got caught with his hand in the air, formed in a fist. He growled but as soon as he caught up with what’s going on, his expression faded away so quickly into a scared puppy face. He crawled back on the ground, leaned against the bed, gasping in fear.

He was crying. There were tears filling up his eyes, falling down bravely. Allison and Chris were looking at him, waiting for him to tell the story about what happened. They were both extremely worried about the werewolf.

“Did you see them?” Isaac asked, couldn’t help his voice to come out shaky.

The worry in Allison’s eyes was getting higher and higher every minute. She leaned forward to Isaac, looking at him. “who?” she asked curiously.

“There were five of them.” Isaac turned his head, looking at both of them. Another tear escaped his eyes. “They wore black. I couldn’t… I couldn’t see their faces. They were covered.” Isaac’s voice was shaking, his breathings were only getting back to normal. But he was clearly still in shock due to what he went through not too long ago.

“What do you mean?” Allison asked, putting her hand on his leg for moral support. “Like Masks?”

“One of them… I could see his eyes” Isaac responded. Chris haven’t said a word yet, listening to Isaac’s story with his full attention on him. “They were greenish-yellow. Like a… Like a firefly.”

Hearing that Chris suddenly stood up, getting everyone’s attentions on him. He walked over to the window as Allison put her hand on Isaac’s shoulder. Chris checked the window, looked everywhere. “Security system wasn’t triggered.”

“Then how did they get in?” Allison asked, turning her head to look at her father over her shoulder.

“They didn’t” Isaac answered, still with fear flickering in his eyes. “It was like they came out of the shadows.” Chris tilted his head up, looking away from the security system as he remembered something from a long ago. Noticing the way his expression changed, Allison looked away from Isaac and looked at her dad.

“Do you know what that means?” she asked but she didn’t get any answer back, Allison parted her lips again. “Dad?”

Chris looked at his daughter, shaking his head slightly. “Um… I’m not sure” he answered with a softy and lower voice. “Listen, the two of you…” He looked at Isaac and Allison. “I need you to keep this quiet for a few hours.”

“From everyone?” Isaac asked, raising his eyebrows.

“From everyone” Chris answered, looked at his daughter. “Especially from Stella. I don’t want her to worry about this.” He didn’t wait for Allison to confirm him, he kept talking. “Just for 24 hours.”

Allison looked up at her dad. “They could’ve killed him, dad” she said, her voice came out like a whisper.

“But they didn’t” Chris said, raising his eyebrows up as he looked at his daughter. “And I think there’s a reason why.” Isaac was definitely curious as he lifted his head up to look at Chris who kept talking. “I think they might have been after me.”

“So, when did you get there?” Agent McCall asked. When the police showed up at the substation, Stella, Scott, Stiles, Kira, and Lydia were still there and the police meant only one thing. That substation was now a crime scene and the police had the bring them to the police station to interrogate, causing Stella to grimace. Yeah, breaking and entering and stuff like that were fun back in the days, but ever since she got caught, she hated being in police stations for these purposes.

But she knew she had no choice, so she found herself, following the cops to the station with Highway to Hell by AC/DC playing in the background.

“At the same time” Stiles answered the agent. Stella didn’t know the reason to the tension between Stiles and Agent McCall, but she could clearly see that he didn’t like him, and those feelings were probably, most likely mutual.

“At the same time as who?” Papa McCall asked. Sheriff Stilinski was sitting behind his desk, rubbing the back of his neck with exhaustion as Stella leaned back on her chair.

“At the same time as us” Scott answered his dad.

The agent raised his eyebrows, trying to figure out who was ‘us’ in this scenario. He sighed, trying not to lose his goddamn mind over this. “At the same time as who exactly?” he asked again.

Stella rolled her eyes, placed her elbows on her knees and looked at Rafael. “At the same as me, Stella Argent and your son, Scott McCall” she responded, stopping on every word like she is talking to a toddler. “Is that really too hard to understand Agent?” Rafael rolled his eyes, getting tired of Stella’s attitude. At the same time, Stella saw the way Sheriff was looking at her, trying to get her to calm down and be collaborative. Stella took a deep breath, calming herself down and leaned back.

“By coincidence?” Rafael asked, deciding to ignore Stella’s attitude at all cost and looked at his son, raising his eyebrows.

Stiles frowned curiously, not understanding. “What do you mean by coincidence?” he asked, his hands were pressed to one another and he was looking at Papa McCall sarcastically.

“That’s what I’m asking you” Agent McCall said. He drew a half circle in the air, looking at the teenagers sitting across him. “All three of you arrived at the same time. Was that a coincidence?”

“Are you asking me?” Scott asked, confused.

“I think he’s asking me” Stiles corrected him, looking at Scott who was sitting next to him.

“I think he’s asking Stella” Lydia interrupted. She knew his obsession about taking Stella down and the way he was talking to Stella was helping her to make assumptions which caused her voice to come out sarcastically, but she didn’t give a damn about it.

“Well, I think he’s asking all three of us” Stella said, straightening up on her spot with her elbows still on her knees but her eyes were on Stiles, Scott, and Lydia.

“Okay, let me answer the questions” Papa McCall said but as soon as he realized what he has said instead of what he was supposed to say, he had to pause. He closed his lips, taking a breath in. Everyone was looking at him, waiting for him to collect his true words. Stella saw sheriff softly smiling with a little amusement in it like the way they all were but there was one small difference between them and the sheriff. Since McCall couldn’t see the sheriff, he wasn’t really hiding it. He didn’t have to hide it. But Stiles and the others were trying to hide their smiles, pressing their lips together. “Let me ask the questions.” Stiles winked at Agent McCall, pointed at him as he was saying ‘right choice of words’ as Agent McCall continued. “Just so I have this absolutely clear…” He went through the pages of his little notebook in his hands. “Barrow was hiding in the chemistry class. Someone left him a coded message on the black board telling him to kill Kira. Then Barrow took Kira to a power substation and tied her up with the intent of electrocuting her, which blacked out the entire town.”

“Sounds about right” Stiles said, looking down at his fingers at the same time Lydia nodded to confirm the story.

“How did you know he’d take her to a power substation?” McCall asked. Stella grimaced thinking what they could tell the agent. They couldn’t just go up and say ‘Lydia and I, we were hearing weird noises in our minds, we screamed, hear the electricity and then thought about he might have brought Kira here. All just assumptions, really’ because it wasn’t believable for someone else. Although, she really wanted to see his reaction it.

But kept her mouth shut.

“Well, because he was an electrical engineer, right?” Stiles said, adding a bit of a sarcasm to his voice as his hazel eyes were on the agent. He was talking like it was too obvious and he couldn’t believe Rafael didn’t or couldn’t know about this. “So where else would he take her?”

Agent McCall looked up, leaned his head back, smiled and looked back at Stilinski’s kid. He was leaning against the table. “That’s one hell of a deduction there, Stiles” Papa McCall said.

“Yeah, what can I say?” Stiles reacted, smiling. “I take after my pops. He’s in law enforcement.” Stiles winked one more time, pointing at his father, making sheriff laugh. As Stella smiled at his answer, she knew Papa McCall had it coming.

Rafael turned around to look at the sheriff, Sheriff Stilinski raised his hand up as if he were saying sorry and looked at his son after clearing his throat. He coughed. “Stiles, just, uh… Just answer the man.”

Stella sighed. “We made a good guess” Stella said, answering McCall in Stiles’ place. She was obviously exhausted with all the interrogation thing. “We found Kira safe and sound and in one piece. Isn’t that what’s important?” She rolled her eyes, crossed her arms in front of her chest and leaned back. She shook her head and spoke underneath her breath with such a low voice that Agent McCall couldn’t hear. “I can’t believe I am at the police station because I saved a life. I didn’t come here for less and worse.”

“What were the two of you doing?” Scott’s dad asked, looking at his son and Kira. Well, there were apparently two answers to this question because when Scott answered with ‘eating pizza’, Kira answered with ‘eating sushi’. McCall frowned, looking at his son. They tried to answer it again. But this time Kira said pizza and Scott said sushi. They paused, stopped, and then looked at each other. They turned back to Agent McCall, answered him again with sushi and pizza. Rafael sighed, looked at sheriff over his shoulder. “You believe this?”

“To be honest, I haven’t believed a word Stiles has said since he learned how to speak” Sheriff said, pulling his hand away from his lips. “But I think these kids found themselves in the right place at the right time and that girl sitting there is very lucky for it.”

“Kira” Agent said, getting her attention on himself as he looked at the black-haired girl. “Is that how you remember?” Lydia, Stiles, Scott and even Stella leaned forward and looked at her, waiting for her answer.

“Yes” she said, nodding softly. “Could I get my phone back now?”

“Sorry, but no.” Agent McCall crabbed the evidence bag that had a yellow phone, Kira’s phone in it. As he exited the room, all five of them followed him out. McCall handed over the evidence bag to another deputy and then looked at Kira. “Kira, a deputy is going to take you home. But we’ll need you to fill out some paperwork first.”

As Agent McCall walked away from them Stella slowly sighed and looked at her friends, happy that another day was finally over.

“Hey, Scott!” Stella shouted as she pushed herself back from Derek’s jeep that she was leaning against and watched Scott turn to look at hearing her calling for him. As he started walking over to her, Stella took a breath. “I know you have to wait for your old man, but I have to return Derek’s precious car to him. Can you follow me and then give me a lift?” she asked. “I’d ask Stiles but he’s going home with his dad, so…” Stella softly chuckled. “Besides, you could use a getaway from the FBI.” Scott softly smiled and gave her a head nod. Stella smiled gratefully and as she turned around to get inside the car, she heard Scott’s voice causing her to look at him back.

“Stella… What you did back there…” Scott started, worried about Stella just thinking about what happened at the substation. “It was so dangerous and stupid. That amount of electricity got to even me. You could have died.” Stella gave out her breath, closed the door she opened just seconds ago and turned her whole body to face Scott who was looking at her with a frown. “Why did you do something like that?”

“I don’t like Kira and honestly, I don’t think she is ever gonna make it to the list of people I like after today but… In that moment, I thought she was in danger” she said, explaining herself. She knew it wasn’t exactly an amazing explanation, but it was enough in her book. “Nous Protégeons ceux qui ne peuvent pas se protéger eux-mémes.” Stella took another breath in and continued confidently, looking at Scott who was confused with all the French. “We protect those who cannot protect themselves.” She gulped down. “If I haven’t seen that damn wolf, even if I died, I would’ve had a chance to save Kira. I was just doing what should have been done. Following the code. Following the right code.”

“You saw the wolf?”

Stella sighed, brushed her messy hair back. She shrugged one shoulder. “I’m not like you guys, Scott” she said, Scott could sense a little bit of a fear in her. “You closed your gates as facing your fears, coming out with a victory from tough situations. I don’t even know what my problem is yet. But… Deaton was right.” She opened the door to driver seat and looked at Scott, somehow looked defeated. “I am starting to confuse reality with these hallucinations and believe me, I am not getting any better nor I have no idea what’s about to happen next if it goes like this.”

“Class starts in five minutes!” Since there was no electricity and no back up power, Coach was walking around in the hallways, yelling through a megaphone. Stella was leaning against a locker to next to Stiles’ as she was waiting for Stiles and Scott. Allison was in her first class and Stella had the same class as Stiles for the next few periods. “Just because there’s no power, don’t expect there to be no school.”

Stiles softly chuckled grabbing his books from the locker and Stella shouted after coach. “That was triple negative. Very impressive, Coach!” she said teasingly. As he turned around to look at her walking backwards, Stella winked.

“Copy that!” he said through the megaphone and proceed to keep walking. Stella smiled, shaking her head, and looked at the people in the hallway. Although, her eyes were on Stiles the moment Stiles dropped something on the floor, a key that confused him because he had no idea what it was or where did it come from. He murmured to himself when Stella decided to ignore because it was still early, and she didn’t have any coffee yet to sober herself up. So, she started looking around.

And that’s when she saw it.

A guy was standing in front of the lockers across them, his stone-cold eyes were locked on Stella. He was sharpening his blade, not moving, or blinking his eyes. He was focused on Stella, causing her heart to beat faster. The sound that was created when the knife met the stone that was sharpening it was echoing through Stella’s mind with every hit. She closed her eyes shut, trying to calm herself down telling herself that it wasn’t real. It wasn’t real.

She opened her eyes back, feeling a sudden motion behind her but instead of the man, she just saw a student who was talking to their friend in a very normal way. She let out a sharp breath from her lips, and then realized what was happening and put on a mask as she turned around to look at Stiles who was trying to stop Scott. She didn’t have to show everyone what she was dealing when they had so many things in their plate already.

“No. No. Stop. Stop!” Stiles said quickly. When Stella saw where Scott was trying to go, she shook her head and turned to him as well. She knew Scott wanted to talk to Kira but Stiles had every right to stop Scott from every going near her and Stella was going to defend Stiles on this forever.

“What? I need to talk to her” Scott fought back.

Stella crossed her arms in front of her chest, raised an eyebrow and looked at Scott. “No, you need to remember someone left a coded message telling Barrow to kill her” she responded. She didn’t trust Kira. She didn’t like Kira. And she definitely didn’t want someone that she saw as her brother to have feelings for a girl that she didn’t trust or have any positive feelings about.

“Which is why I need to talk to her” Scott argued back, raising up his voice even a bit. As he was fixing the bag on his shoulder, he was still looking at Kira.

“Scott, no way” Stiles said, determined. “Until we figure out if she’s just another psychotic monster that’s going to start murdering everybody, I vote against any and all interactions.” As he was talking his hands were in the air, heatedly joining the conversation.

Stella nodded. “I definitely agree, and I can promise you, this is an objective thought” she said before she pressed her lips together making them a straight line and pushed herself off the wall. She shook her head, looking at Scott. “You saw what happened that night.”

“What if she’s like me?” Scott asked curiously, being his usual optimist self.

“That girl walked through 1.21 gigawatts of electricity, Scott” Stella answered, taking her eyes from Kira who was walking away from them now, and she looked at Scott. “She is not like you.” As Stiles shut his locker closed, Scott started to walk away from them causing Stella to sigh in defeat. She shook her head. “He’s going to talk to her, isn’t he?” Stella was still watching Scott walk away with a grimace.

“Probably” Stiles answered with a sigh.

Stella bit her lower lip and watched the hallway Scott walked away for a while and then slowly tapped Stiles’ elbow to get his attention. “I need to find Danny to ask him something about the big party that we probably all need right now” she started, brushing her hair back. “I’ll see you in the class but until then, if anything happens and I mean anything at all, just let me know.” Stiles nodded, confirming her and then Stella walked away with her long hair waving and bouncing with every step.

“Don’t you have portable generators or something?” Ethan stopped, hearing Danny’s voice and to hear more, he focused on his hearing. They were in the locker room and the voice could be echoing but since he was a werewolf, he could focus perfectly. “It’s a black light party. It’s not like you need a ton of power…” Danny gave out his breath angrily as he was listening to the other line. Ethan was fixing his pants since they were just out of PE. “Okay, yeah. I get it.” Danny hung up the phone and after slamming the locker door, he made his way out of the locker room.

“Black light party?” Ethan asked when Danny was passing him by.

Danny stopped, looked at him. “More like canceled party” he answered, smiling in defeat. “The venue I booked won’t have power for at least another day.” He sighed, shaking his head. “Stella is probably going to kill me.”

Ethan leaned against the iron bars as he was looking at Danny, he slowly parted his lips. “You want help finding a new place?”

“What’s the point?” Danny questioned, moving his shoulder up and down, his eyes are on Ethan. “Nothing in town’s going to have power.” He smiled softly. “Thanks anyway.” As he walked away from Ethan, the former alpha was trying to push his brain to think if there was something he could do.

But then he heard Aiden.

“You want to throw a Halloween Party?” Aiden asked sarcastically. He listened most of the conversation and he couldn’t help but enjoy his brother’s suffering. “What’s next? You gonna join the Yearbook Club?”

Ethan turned to look at his twin, sighed. He crossed his arms in front of his body looking at Aiden, weary. “Just trying to do something nice” Ethan responded to his brother.

Aiden shrugged, spreading his arms to sides. “Why?” he asked. “Who cares?”

Ethan pointed Danny with a head nod. “He does.” Aiden shrugged and then scoffed causing Ethan to sigh and look at his brother again. “You don’t get it, do you?” he said. “Scott doesn’t care about power. He cares about people. You want to be a wolf in his pack? Try being a human in high school.” He took a step forward, heading to the exit but then he thought about something, smiled, and stepped back. Ethan looked at his brother. “Or at least, you know, to get Stella back… I don’t know if you heard, but she was also helping Danny out to throw this party.”

Ethan walked away after saying this, not saying another word, he left his brother alone in the locker room.

When Aiden sat right next to her in Biology class, she was looking down at the notebook in front of her leaning her head against her palm. On the next desk, Lydia was sitting. They had an aisle between them, but they were still close enough to talk with their normal voices. They were talking about one thing, though. How there was finally a new Biology teacher after Mr. Harris, and it was none other than Lydia’s mother.

As Ms. Martin put a pink paper sheet on her, she smiled and looked away from Lydia to their new biology teacher who was looking back at her. “Hey Stella” young woman said with a sincere smile.

Stella smiled back. “Hey” she said with the sweetest voice that Aiden never heard from her before. He was definitely surprised because she sounded innocent. Not that she wasn’t innocent, she was just always hiding behind a mask.

Ms. Martin turned to her right and looked at her daughter. “Sweetheart, since this is my first class and I haven’t taught in five years, I just want to remind you of one thing.” Stella knew she was nervous as heck. She smiled softly, looking down at her book her eyes moving on the pages as she was listening in on the Martins. “Try not to embarrass me.”

Lydia looked down at her green shoes and then back to her anxious face. “You should’ve thought about that before wearing those shoes.” She was holding the back of her neck. Ms. Martin looked down at her shoes and then back to her daughter who was smiling. “Love you.”

“Love you, too” Ms. Martin said back. Then her green eyes found Stella. After a few night overs, Ms. Martin grown to like Stella and she and Allison were her favorite of Lydia’s friends. “Not embarrassing me situation implies to you as well, Stella.” Stella smiled, nodded and then as she walked away to communicate with the other students, Stella looked back at the paper that was the syllabus and the book in front of her.

“Why’s Lydia’s mom teaching biology?” Aiden asked, pulling his book in front of him. He was wearing a red t-shirt today and he had his usual smart-ass smirk on him as always. Stella had to admit he looked hot but there was something else bothering her that she simply couldn’t ignore.

She pressed her red lips together and thought about how to answer Aiden’s question, but then decided to just go for it. “Because Mr. Harris used to teach biology” she said quickly, speaking faster than usual. She wanted this conversation to be over as soon as possible. “Until his new occupation…” She shrugged and looked at Aiden for the first time since he sat right next to her. “Human sacrifice.” She formed up a quick and sarcastic smile but then it was gone, and her eyes were back at her biology book.

“What?” He sounded surprised. It was obvious he wasn’t expecting such a mood swing after the little soft conversation they had back in the basement. “I didn’t kill him.” Stella raised her brows as she was saying ‘really?’, moved them up and down as she scoffed. Stella continued going through the course book in front of her while Aiden was still looking at the young girl. “Stella, what? What’s wrong?”

Stella sighed; she knew Lydia was listening on them, but she didn’t care. She had to get this out of her chest. She held her hair and released them from her shoulder. “In the last couple of days… I helped and saved someone’s life and that felt really good” she started slowly with a flat voice. She thought about how she felt about herself when she helped her friends save Kira even with the stupid hallucination she had and how she got electrocuted. She slowly turned her head to look at Aiden and then continued. “And I look at you…” She shrugged, pressing her lips. “And all I can think is that you helped kill Boyd.” She sighed again. She was never this honest to anyone before except Stiles and Allison, but she couldn’t bring herself to think about it. She took a deep breath. “I thought… I thought I could ignore this… this feeling… and believe me I’ve tried. When you almost died, I thought I could do it but then I saved someone’s life and you…” Her tongue moved on her lip softly, her brown eyes on him. “You’re not just a bad boy, Aiden. You are a bad guy.” Stella’s voice got lower and lower as everything she was feeling at the moment was somehow too much for her. Stella looked at Aiden, who looked like he was hurt. He was looking down, not knowing what to say or do. She shrugged one shoulder and then continued with the same low voice. “And I don’t wanna be with bad guys.” She turned around, looking down at her book, biting her lip. She could feel Lydia’s gaze on her and she could feel the burning on her eyes but she ignored everything.

Meanwhile, Aiden leaned back and looked at Danny with the emotions he had in him that he didn’t like. “I think I know a place where you can have your party.”

Lydia closed her locker and rolled her eyes as she saw who was looking at her with a smile leaning against the locker next to hers. She crossed her arms in front of her chest and looked at Aiden. “No” she said, determined.

Aiden frowned, hearing that one-worded answer from her even though he didn’t say anything yet. “What, Lydia?” he said, not knowing what to say twice today which was definitely a new thing for him. “Why? You don’t even know why I came to you for.”

Lydia took a deep breath, turned her whole body, and looked at Aiden. “You’re going to ask my help for Stella and my answer is definitely no” she said. Aiden dropped his shoulder, let out a breath from his nose. Lydia continued with the same attitude. “I agree with everything Stella said back in the class. You are not just a bad boy; you are also a bad guy and I don’t want to be friends with bad guys or my friends to be with bad guys.” She fixed the bag on her shoulder and before she flipped her hair and walk away, she parted her lips to say one more thing. “So, no, Aiden. I am not going to help you.” She scoffed. “And with what you’re doing, you’re definitely not helping yourself either.”

As she walked away, all Aiden could do was stare at her but then he quickly turned around to find his brother and Danny.

“Where did you say the guy was who lives here?” Danny asked again, looking around. Meantime Ethan was looking at his brother with a silent thank you, through the window, who was dealing with the electricity at the time in the balcony but as soon as he heard Danny, his brown eyes found him.

“He is out of town” Ethan answered and then they heard the engine revving when Aiden pulled a cable to himself. He turned to look at his brother, gave him a thumbs up letting him now that everything is set. Ethan walked up to the beam that had fluorescence on it and then light it up purple.

Danny smiled, happy with the result. “Oh yeah” he said, causing Ethan to smile as he saw Danny happy.

Isaac gulped in fear with the thing he saw as soon as he stepped into the loft. He may have wanted the twins dead but a death coming from Derek just because they threw a party at his loft sounded like a worse way to go and he wouldn’t ask for it, even for his worst enemy.

Isaac’s eyes were moving on the bodies that were covered with paint that glowed in ultraviolet ray, dancing to the loud music. He gulped down once again when Allison walked up to him and stood near him, gulping down as well. “Derek can never know about this” he murmured; his voice reached out to Allison but got lost later through the loud cheering.

Meanwhile Ethan was walking towards Danny with a drink in his hand, pushing through the bodies to make way for himself. “You happy?” he asked, pointing around with his head, smiling and looking at him.

Danny smiled back. He leaned into Ethan to be heard and not yell too much. “Very.”

“Good” Ethan reacted. “Now it’s my time to be happy.” Ethan grabbed him by the arms and turned his body over to the lady who was doing the painting stuff. “This one needs to get painted.”

“Face or body?” she screamed to be heard. Danny looked at Ethan, asking his opinion. Ethan smirked, put his red cup on the table and he ripped his shirt off with one move.

He looked over to the painted and parted his lips. “Body.”

As the woman got to it, the bartender yelled “I need ice!” through the crowd. Ethan slightly patted Danny’s shoulder, told him that he got it and got lost through the crowd.

Ethan could still hear the loud music as he was walking down the dark halls, trying to get ice for the bartender. Of course, it was related to him being a powerful werewolf and all, but he didn’t think of it too much. He walked inside the room and opened the light, pulling the string as he headed for the ice.

His hand touched a bag of ice when the light went off. Ethan frowned in confusion, looked up at the light. He touched it, fixed it and turned it on again but it only took only few seconds to go out again. He repeated the same thing, took a deep breath, and went back to ice.

The light went out again. When Ethan did the same thing, he realized he wasn’t alone in the room. There were people in masks, completely in black, ninja looking guys around him. And when Ethan noticed them, they jumped on him and the door closed shut.

“It just showed up there on my key ring this morning” Stiles shouted to be heard through the loud music playing as he walked into Derek’s loft with Scott and Kira, making their way through the dancing crowd. Few steps later, they all stopped and looked at each other. Stiles continued to talk. “I asked my dad if he put it there, but he said he didn’t know anything about it.”

“It’s just a key, right?” Scott questioned, raising his voice up.

“Yeah, but it’s not mine!” He slowly shook his head, continued. “I even asked Stella if it was hers, but she said she didn’t know. That key doesn’t belong to her either and I don’t know how it got there or what it’s for.”

Scott frowned. “Why did you ask Stella in the first place?” he asked curiously.

Stiles shrugged. “We had the same classes yesterday and three classes today, so I thought maybe she put it there not to lose it” young man explained, acting like it’s a normal thing but that’s when Scott realized how close those two grown to be, remembering the first time that they met and how much they annoyed each other. “I know that she’s not good with small stuff. She loses them quite often and she hates carrying a bag, so…”

Scott leaned towards Stiles to not yell much as he was talking. “You want to leave so we can figure out?” he asked, and Stiles actually considered it but as he lifted his head up while thinking, some random girl came up to them and placed a soft kiss on Stiles’ check. Scott raised his eyebrows and smiled in shock with the fact that how sudden it was, the girl pulled herself back.

“Happy Halloween!” The girl exclaimed and then disappeared through the crowd. Kira and Scott were smiling as they were looking at each other.

And then Stiles came to himself, parted his lips. He had a glowing orange lipstick mark on his check now. “It can wait. It can wait.” He slowly and friendly tapped on Scott’s shoulder and as he also disappeared through the crowd, Scott was only smiling and watching his friend walk away after the girl but then he suddenly held Kira’s hand, not to lose her to the crowd that was almost like pulling her away from him. He smiled; Kira turned towards Scott. “Thanks!” she said.

“For what?” Scott asked.

“For everything.” The smile on Kira’s face didn’t seem like it was gonna go away anytime soon but the smile on Scott’s face faded away the minute he saw Allison. As they were looking at each other from a distance, Kira felt awkward and pulled her hand back from Scott’s grip.

Stella walked towards the wall with her third drink of the night in her hands, through the colorful dancing bodies and sighed. The need in her to drink… She thought about New York, she couldn’t help herself but then she found herself pushing the thoughts away. She had trust in her that she wasn’t going back to that place when she had her family with her, alive. And it was actually pretty easy to do so. The music was so loud that she could feel every rhythm inside her, it helped her with the distraction from that subject but as she looked around… This wasn’t the thing she had in mind when her and Danny came up with the idea of this Halloween party. Also, the fact that Aiden helped them to get this thing together, really bugged her out for some reason. Oh, and there was also this fact that she couldn’t stop thinking about as she was sipping from her vodka and that was how dead they were gonna be if Derek were to find out about this.

Derek should’ve never, ever found out about this. _Ever._

Stella pulled herself back trying not to spill her drink on the floor when Aiden jumped on her with his green glowing muscular body and red fake fangs in his mouth, growling. Aiden took the fake things out of his mouth, smiled like he was waiting some attention or affection from Stella, parted his lips and started speaking. “Not as good as the real ones” he shouted to get Stella to hear him.

“Or as lethal” Stella finished his sentences. She took another sip from the red cup, felt the alcohol rushing through her system. She could definitely remember why she was drinking that hard back in New York. She was never going to be that girl again but… She really needed that today.

As she was watching the crowd with an empty expression, Aiden’s didn’t change even a bit. This time, if he really wanted her back, he had to get along with her and besides… She was right after all. “Okay, sure” he said, screaming to be heard through the loud music. “I deserve that.” Stella sent him a sarcastic smile that lasted a second and meant ‘you think?’ while Aiden continued. “I deserve basically everything you say about me. But you know…” He pointed the dancing crowd that was glowing with neon. “I was pretty instrumental setting this up.”

“All this?” Stella said raising her eyebrows, looking around and then looking back to Aiden who had a proud smile on his face. “If I wanted to go to a rave, I’d get in a time machine and go back to the ‘90s.” She softly tapped Aiden’s biceps goodbye and then attempted to walk away but stopped when Aiden held her by the arm.

She turned around, looked into his eyes as he was questioning why he did that. “You are drinking” he stated, worried about her as he remembered the New York stories.

“I’ll be fine” Stella sharply responded and then her gaze moved between his hand that was still around her arm and then back to his eyes. “Once I’m away from you.” She didn’t wait for the reaction on Aiden’s face. She pulled her hand away from his grip and made her way through the crowd, getting out from the other side. She took her cup to her lips to get another sip but cursed as she saw the cup was empty and she gave out a deep breath between her lips as she placed her empty cup on the ground. 

“You know…” Stella turned her head to the source of the voice and saw Allison walking towards her. “It’s not really what you do at a party, sipping your drink all alone in the corner” she said, pointing the red cup on the floor. Stella smiled, looking at her cousin. Her body was covered as the rest of them and she was wearing a white skirt and a neon pink sports bra which was also glowing with the ultraviolet lights. “Also, the fact that, you helped Danny organize this party in the first place…”

Stella shrugged. “Aiden organized this party” she murmured with a voice volume that she knew Allison could hear. Allison softly chuckled, she instantly knew it was the problem but before she could say anything, Stella continued. “And I…” She sharply sighed. “I just don’t think I am in the party mood right now.” She really needed another drink, but she didn’t want to go through the whole crowd to get to the bar and then come back to her spot. She wasn’t that desperate yet to get a drink. “Eh, don’t worry about me. I’ll make this party my bitch in a second.” Allison raised an eyebrow and looked at her cousin with a smile. Stella chuckled, knowing the meaning of that expression. “Go on Argent. Isaac is probably waiting for you.” Then with the thought, she narrowed her eyes and grinned. “He is like a puppy, isn’t he?”

“Oddly, yes” Allison responded, smiling. Stella giggled at Allison’s answer while she licked her lips and parted them again to speak. “I know you’re not fine and I know something is bothering you and I am not going to dig in just yet and I am definitely not doing that here, at a party…” Stella smiled softly, knotting. “Just tell me this.” Allison sighed. “Are you gonna be okay?”

Stella let out a small and grateful chuckle. “I am always okay” she said, putting on a very believable smile on her face. She pushed her softly with her shoulder. “Go on and have some fun. Don’t worry about me for the night. Come on, it’s Halloween!”

Allison smiled and nodded but as she was walking to Isaac who she saw that he was waiting for her, she couldn’t help but worry about her cousin more.

Lydia was across Stella, doing the exact same thing. She was leaning against the wall; her green eyes were moving on the crowd watching them dance and go wild. She had no idea why she came to this party in the first place but there she was, drinking vodka without glowing neon.

Lydia spotted Allison and Isaac who were dancing to each other very closely. She let out a soft ‘oh’ and then spoke softly. “Finally,” she said. Everyone knew they had some attraction towards each other, but they were fighting it for so long. Lydia could guess that it was because of the Scott factor but the sexual tension was just driving her nuts.

Her eyes moved away from them to Stiles who was also dancing with someone, being not very good at it. She softly chuckled. “Awkwardly” she said sarcastically and then she saw Aiden, dancing with not one but two girls at the same time, a lot closer than he should’ve been. For a second, she thought about how he came up to her in the school asking help for Stella and then rolled her eyes. “Predictably.”

She shook her head, leaning her shoulder against the wall and then looked in the other way. She noticed Stella. Judging by the look on her face, she could see that she was aware of Aiden’s intimacy with other girls. She sighed, cursed Aiden and when they came eye to eye, she softly smiled at her friend. “He is a dick” she whispered, causing Stella to scoff and then walk away.

Lydia took a deep breath as she watched Stella but then she heard something weird through the loud music, she frowned and straightened up. She looked her left, right, trying to find the source of the voice.

And then she saw him. The ninja man…

But that only took a second, the ninja man disappeared into the shadows as soon as Lydia laid eyes on him. She quickly turned her head, seeing the other one. She gasped in fear, she was breathing heavily, hearing him snarling. She was suddenly feeling like the room was too crowded and everything was coming onto her.

The next time the ninja man appeared, he was a lot closer to her.

“Scott” she said but it was so low that even if Scott focused on her, he could barely hear her through this loud music. She repeated herself, shouting this time. “Scott!” Lydia turned around, made her way to the outside. She was running, trying to escape.

After a while later, she found herself in the balcony. The people were dancing and having fun inside while Lydia was panting and trying to control her breathing. Lydia closed the door behind her, letting herself think that she was safe. She walked up to the bars of the balcony, looked down and when she heard the weird noise again, she turned around.

She saw them appearing from the shadows, from the ground. She wasn’t safe. She tried to turn around and scream but the minute she turned around, another ninja appeared in front of him and raised his black hand. This hand motion ripped Lydia’s voice and scream out of her throat and her body or at least that’s what made her feel like it.

And then that hand went up to her ear and his eyes glowed yellow, like a firefly. 

Danny was looking around as he was dancing, trying to find the person he was looking for. Then he saw one of the twins, decided to take his chance. “Ethan?” he asked. Yes, he was in love with Ethan, but Ethan and Aiden were identical twins and he still didn’t know how to tell them apart. Definitely, not his proudest moment…

“Aiden” Aiden corrected him.

“Where’s Ethan?” Danny asked curiously.

“I’m looking for him, too” Aiden shouted for Danny to hear him.

“I haven’t seen him in like half an hour” Danny said which worried Aiden. He started to look around, trying to see his twin but he saw Stella, sitting on the staircase with her eyes closed and he realized all he ever wanted to do right now was to go to her and maybe talk to her, knowing she’s seen him with those girls.

But first he had to find his brother.

“Is something wrong?” Danny asked, trying to get his attention. “Aiden?” But the twin started walking the opposite direction from Stella without saying anything to Danny who followed him and continued shouting after him. “Aiden!”

“Hey, you alright?” As she heard Stiles who was walking towards her with two beers in his hands, Stella turned her head to look at the young man. She watched him sit next to her and then before he handed the bottle to her, he pulled out his keychain to use the bottle opener on it. He opened the bottles, gave one to Stella. “Here you go.”

“Thanks” Stella murmured as she grabbed the bottle from his hands and then with the thing she noticed, she softly chuckled. She pointed the keychain with a slight nod. “I can’t believe you thought painting your body was so ordinary and then decided to paint your key, Stilinski” she commented sarcastically with a voice that he could hear. Stiles had no idea what she was talking about and seeing his expression, Stella chuckled and grabbed the key from his hand to show it to him. “Your key has phosphors on it. Look.” Stiles took the key away and as he was looking at it carefully and very confusingly, Stella placed her elbow on a step up and continued. “So, tell me… where is that girl you were dancing so awkwardly with?”

Stiles laughed, shaking his head, and putting the key away as he shrugged. “I came here because I was so tired of dancing awkwardly with her” he explained, looking at the young girl who was sipping from her beer. “Also, you looked like you needed alcohol from away.” Stella raised her bottle as a thank you, making Stiles smile as he continued. “Besides, Lydia mentioned what happened in the Biology class today. I thought maybe you could use a company and maybe you want to talk about it.”

Stella couldn’t help her giggle that escaped from her lips. Maybe the alcohol was kicking in after all. “Are you guys talking about my personal life behind my back?” she questioned, raising her eyebrows as she looked at Stiles.

Stiles nodded. “My favorite segment of the pack meetings” he teasingly said with a smile. “I personally love Isaac-Allison-Scott triangle the most but apparently Kira is now included in that as well.” Stella frowned, Stiles sighed and then looked at her. “That reminds me…” And then he told her what they did before the party. He mentioned how Kira had some pictures on her phone that Stiles didn’t know what kind, how Scott knew about that, but he didn’t tell anyone and he mentioned how they copied some access cards illegally and went to Police station just for Kira to delete those pictures.

When Stiles was done talking, Stella’s eyes found Scott and Kira dancing across the room. “I don’t trust her, Stiles” Stella murmured, taking a deep breath. “I really don’t trust her.”

Stiles nodded, took a sip from his beer, and then looked back at Stella. “Hey, you okay?” he asked, causing Stella to look at him for a second. And then without even thinking about an answer, without thinking at all, with effect of the alcohol in her system, she leaned towards Stiles and placed her lips on his soft ones. Stiles was surprised at first, not being able to kiss her back but then he came to and his lips started moving on hers. When they pulled away, Stiles frowned and looked at Stella who was just opening her brown eyes back. “Okay, um… not that I am complaining but, uh, why…” He blinked few times in shock as he continued. “Why did you do that?”

“I could blame the drink, but to be honest, I have no idea” she murmured, shook her head to both sides. Her heart was pounding. “I guess… I just had a long ass day and all I want is a distraction from…” She couldn’t say the real reason so instead, she said something else as she continued. “… everything that’s been going on.”

Stiles softly nodded, letting out a soft breath. “Is this about Aiden?” he asked curiously, knowing the real reason and the thing that she couldn’t say. Stella frowned; Stiles was looking at a spot far away, one of the reasons how he knew what he knew. “Because he is looking right here, right at us, right now, and I am pretty sure he is dreaming my guts on a stake.” Stella turned around to see Aiden who was looking at them with one of his hands on the door handle just standing there. Danny was trying to tell him something, trying to get his attention and seeing that, caused Stella to smile uncontrollably, remembering the way he was dancing with those girls carefreely.

She turned to look at Stiles again with a smile. “That’s good” she said and kissed Stiles again, her hand on his check. Stiles’ hand covered her hand and they kissed until they couldn’t breathe anymore.

Stiles pulled back first with a thought popped up in his head. He frowned, still in the effect of the kissing. “I am sorry, I just had a thought” he whispered. Stella shrugged like it was a no big deal. She took a big sip from her beer when Stiles started to speak. “What are phosphors?”

As Stiles grabbed the key and shook it in front of them, he looked at Stella who licked her lips before explaining. “Any substance that luminesces” she explained, shrugging. “It’s in your teeth and your fingernails. Laundry detergent. It reacts to the UV light.” She exhaled from her nose and then continued. “That’s why everyone in this goddamn loft is glowing like a freaking Christmas tree.”

Stiles shook his head, showing Stella that he understood but then he frowned. There was something else that was bothering him. “How would I get phosphors on my key?” he curiously questioned.

Stella tilted her head, resting her cheek on her shoulder as she looked at Stiles. “Have you been handling chemicals?”

“No, I don’t think I…” Stiles stopped talking, his hazel eyes locked on the key. Stella frowned, worried about him, and looked at him curiously and definitely feeling confused. “I’m sorry. I’m really sorry. I really don’t want to leave you alone, but I just thought of something and I have to go.” Stiles stood up from the staircase and as he was standing in front of Stella, he was feeling guilty that he was leaving her alone but he had to. He just had to. “I am really, really-”

Stella interrupted him with an ensuring smile on her face. “You don’t need to apologize Stilinski, it’s okay” she said. It really was okay for her. She just wanted to distract herself and she actually managed to do it, even for a second. Stiles nodded gratefully and then disappeared through the crowd.

Stella sighed, looked around. She didn’t want to admit but she was actually looking for a certain someone and when she couldn’t find him, she rolled her eyes and grabbed her beer bottle.

She went upstairs.

Putting her beer bottle next to the couch, Stella took a deep breath as her fingers ran through her long brown hair. She walked inside the bathroom. Her hands grabbed the sides the sink, she looked at her reflection on the mirror. Her eyes were red, there were bags underneath them. She looked like a mess, she felt like a mess and she didn’t even know why. “Get it together Argent” she murmured to herself. She could still hear the loud music coming from downstairs, but she tried not to care. She took a deep breath and gulped, trying to get rid of the numb in her throat. “Get it together. He is just a-”

And then the lights flickered, later they went out. Stella looked up, frowned. And when the door shut closed, she startled. She found herself trying to open the door, but it wasn’t working a bit. It was definitely closed by something else, by something strong. Something supernatural…

She stopped when a sound reached out to her from behind. She turned around and then she was face to face with a black ninja dude with a mask. She looked around; her heart was pounding in her chest. She looked for a way out, but she was surrounded. There was no way to escape.

She parted her lips to scream but one of the ninjas stepped in, raised his palm up and Stella’s voice dragged away from her throat. Nothing came out, there was only silent. The Ninjas jumped on her and that was the last thing she remembered.

She blacked out.

Allison grabbed Isaac’s chin and parted her lips. “Turn to the mirror. Turn to the mirror.” As they were dancing, Allison noticed something behind Isaac’s ear and pulled him into the nearest room with a mirror to show him that. Isaac looked at the mirror with the right angle so that he was able to see it. “You see that?” Allison asked, showing the number 5 backwards.

Isaac frowned. “What is that?” he responded in shock.

“Looks like a number five.”

As Isaac was about to nod, he heard something. A man groaning from the distance. He turned to Allison. “Did you hear that?” he asked with a whisper. Allison shook her head no when Isaac was focused on the ice bags. He slowly walked towards that direction to see what was behind it and the only thing he saw was Ethan who was shaking and shriveled up.

“Aiden, over here!” Danny shouted over when he found Lydia, freezing to death in the balcony. Aiden walked towards him and the minute he saw Lydia shaking on the ground, he quickly started running, instead of walking. He quickly reached out to her with worry inside him. He couldn’t put Lydia and Stella in the same part. Stella was… She was different.

But Lydia was his friend whatever the hell she thought about him, and Aiden knew he cared for her as well. “Lydia!” Aiden speedily turned to look at Danny. “What happened?” Young girl was still shivering. “What happened to her?”

“I don’t know but she’s freezing” Danny answered, he was as worried as Aiden was. “She’s practically hypothermic.”

“We gotta get her inside” he said, looked around. “Help me.”

When they walked inside and Danny saw the heater ahead, he quickly looked over his shoulder at Aiden who was carrying Lydia. “Over here. There’s a heating vent.” Aiden quickly put Lydia in front of the heater and looked around. His brown eyes spotted the staircase but this time it was empty, which caused a disturbing feeling in his stomach. Something was wrong and after seeing Lydia like that, he had to be sure that she was okay.

He had to find her.

Aiden stood up and looked at Danny. “You stay with her” he pretty much ordered, looking at the young man. “I need to find Stella.” Danny nodded and kneeled next to Lydia, turning towards to look at her, while Aiden quickly went through the still-dancing crowd and reached the staircase. He had no idea where she was. He looked around and then he thought about something.

With that, he started going up the stairs, taking three steps each time.

“Stella?” Aiden knew something was off the minute he stepped into the room. The empty beer bottle was on the ground next to the brown couch, but Stella was nowhere to be seen. Aiden let his werewolf abilities out and glowed his blue eyes. Then he heard loud and unsteady heartbeats. They were coming from the bathroom. “Stella!” Aiden ran towards the door, pulled it open.

That’s when he saw her. Same as Lydia. Her whole body was shivering, shaking. She was shriveled up on the tiled ground.

Aiden walked fast towards her, wrapped her cold body with his arms and with one smooth motion, he grabbed Stella and stood up. Stella’s face softly rested against his chest, but she was so cold then Aiden couldn’t help but gasp anxiously. “Oh God, you’re freezing” he murmured, brushing her hair back. “Stella.” He couldn’t help her name came out from his lips like a whisper.

He quickly headed towards the staircase and then to the heating vent that they put Lydia in front of. “Oh God, is she okay?” Danny yelled the minute he saw Aiden carrying unconscious Stella between his arms. He was already worried about Lydia and now Stella? He wondered what the hell was going on tonight. “What happened?”

“Probably the same thing that happened to Lydia” Aiden responded holding the girl between his arms super tight, trying to keep her warm and keep her safe. But then he frowned, seeing something. That was also the same thing Allison and Isaac noticed as they were trying to trigger Ethan’s healing. Derek who also got attacked near his car, noticed that at the same time. Aiden looked behind Stella’s ear and then Lydia’s.

They all had a backwards number 5 behind their ears.

Stella gasped for air when she came to, holding onto Aiden’s muscular arms by reflex. It was too cold for her to focus around her. She was shivering, looking ahead. “Stella?” he murmured, trying to see if she was okay. He saw Lydia who was also awake now, and Danny’s arms were covering her, keeping her warm.

Although… Lydia was in better shape than Stella. So, noticing that, he stood up slowly. “I’ll go try to find a blanket” he said, leaving them alone. Lydia scooted over to the heater, meanwhile Stella was trying to catch a breath. Her hands were gripping Aiden’s arms so tight, but he didn’t seem to care.

“They came out of the dark” she murmured with a voice that was full of terror. Young Argent was clearly remembering the fact that those ninja guys ripped her voice out of throat. She let out few shallow breaths, causing Aiden to sigh as he placed his chin on the top of her head and held her tighter like this could protect her from the evil around them.

Derek groaned and squeezed every muscle in his body not to roll his eyes. He was looking at the dancing bodies and the loud music. He could feel the anger inside him as he was walking towards the DJ booth and when he got stopped by a hand on his chest, he felt the anger forming in a matter that he could actually touch and feel it.

“Bro, sorry” the guy said, looking at Derek. “The Bloody Beetroot doesn’t take requests.” Derek nodded telling him to understand but then stepped forward once again, only to get stopped again. “Bro, seriously. I said the DJ doesn’t take-”

Derek wasn’t a guy who could keep his cool when he was angry. He grabbed the guy’s throat, interrupting him and smiling with a smile that actually said ‘I will kill you’ and pulled him up from his throat. “He’ll take mine.” He threw the guy aside and walked over to the DJ again. He smiled at it, grabbed the vinyl case, causing music to stop immediately. DJ spread his arms to both sides, not knowing what the hell was going on when all the guests were looking at Derek who was scowling with anger. “GET OUT!” he screamed; his voice was thundering. Which caused everyone to clamor and run as quick as possible to get out of the loft and get away from the angry werewolf.

And then Aiden stood up still holding Stella and looked around to see those ninja men were the only thing was left in the loft after everyone has left the building. Aiden quickly turned to Danny who was still holding Lydia. He loosened up his grip on Stella. “Get them out of here” Aiden said, looking at Danny and tried to guide Stella towards Danny, but she shook her head, causing Aiden to stop mid-way.

“No, no…” She gulped down, her eyes were hazy, but she wasn’t that cold anymore. She was still shaking but she was more focused. “No, I’m not leaving” Stella murmured, looking Aiden in the eyes. “I’m not… I’m not leaving you.” Danny was looking at Aiden asking what he should do, meanwhile Aiden was looking at Stella as his hands were rubbing on her shoulders and arms to get her body temperature to go back to normal.

Aiden looked at Danny, nodded. “It’s okay” he said, pulling Stella closer. “Take care of her.”

Danny nodded and guided Lydia out of the exit, but Lydia looked behind, her gaze found Aiden as she parted her lips. “Find Scott” she told him and then walked away from them with Danny’s guidance.

That’s when Stella noticed the five ninja men around them. She gasped in fear once again causing Aiden to squeeze her arm for support. As he held her closer in a protective way, Isaac and Allison walked in with Ethan that they were carrying with his arms around their neck. Scott and Kira were now back inside from the roof where they were having a calm conversation.

In that moment, they were all trying to figure out what the hell was going on. 

The ninjas turned their heads synchronously to Aiden who pulled Stella behind him as soon as he felt that to protect her. He took a deep breath, feeling anxious and worried and definitely confused. “Guys, they’re all looking at me” he announced, he was looking at the ninjas back. The ninjas took a step forward, Aiden took a step back causing Stella to take a step back behind him. His arms were still holding her. “Why are they all looking at me?” The Ninjas took a step forward. The tension in the room was so sharp that everyone was able to feel it in the air. Aiden yelled again, scared. “Guys!”

Then Derek and Scott attacked the ninjas, Aiden quickly pulled Stella back. One of the ninjas tried to attack Aiden, but Derek protected him, mostly to protect Stella. But the ninja blocked his attack, kicked him in the back causing him to fall to the ground.

Meanwhile Scott was still standing and fighting with another one of those ninja men.

Derek stood up, broke one’s neck but the ninja healed himself quickly with a sound of bone crunching. Someone groaned, someone growled. A ninja tossed Derek to the wall, meanwhile Scott was on the ground defeated as well. 

Derek noticed the ninjas looking at Aiden once again. He quickly stood up and pulled Stella away from them even though she struggled to be free. If they couldn’t stop the ninjas and save Aiden, he could at least save Stella from them. He walked far away from Aiden who was now the target of the ninjas, holding Stella in his arms.

Isaac took a step forward, claws out. But when another ninja stepped forward and took out a katana from its chest. It swung the sword above its head few times and then looked at Isaac, daring him to come closer if he had the balls for it.

Isaac stepped back; the ninja looked back at Aiden.

Two of them came from behind, held Aiden by the arms. Derek was looking at the twin as he was holding Stella closer to his warm body because she was still cold. And Stella was holding onto his arms, holding her breath, looking at Aiden. “Somebody, do something!” she yelled but no one had the balls to do something after getting their ass kicked. Several times by them…

And Derek wasn’t going to let Stella go.

The third ninja walked up to Aiden and put his palm on his ear, scratched his ear and then turned around to look at something, someone else as Aiden fell onto the ground. Stella didn’t even look who was the next target. She pushed Derek’s arms away from her and ran towards Aiden, not caring the ninjas anymore. She put one hand on his cold chest, moving up and down with his heavy and shallow breaths.

After making sure Aiden was okay, Stella thought about looking up. As her gaze moved to the ninjas, she noticed the way they were focused on Scott. She softly gulped down, her hand still on Aiden’s chest. Scott glowed his red alpha eyes, groaned and growled at the ninjas, ready to fight but then the sun came up.

The ninjas faded into a grey cloud and disappeared.

Scott look around. “What the hell were those things?” he shouted; Ethan ran towards Aiden, trying to see if he was okay. He kneeled down next to Stella, near his brother while Stella’s eyes moved around, wondering the answer to that question as well.

Meanwhile, Isaac turned his head to look at Allison. “Your dad’s 24 hours are up.”

As Stiles stood right in front of the chemistry lab, he took a deep breath in. He knew how ridiculous and unreal the theory that popped up in his head, but it wasn’t matter if that theory was true. He wished with his entire heart that it wasn’t, but he had to check.

Stiles sighed, pulled out the fugitive key from his pocket. He put the key into the lock, he turned it and it clicked, opening the door. Stiles tightened his lips together with anxiety rising inside him. Agent McCall’s words started to echo in his mind. _Barrow was hiding in the chemistry closet at the school. Someone left him a coded message on the black board telling him to kill Kira._ Stiles breathed out between his lips and stood right in front of the black board. The coded message was still on it. It wasn’t erased.

Stiles grabbed a chalk, gulped down and looked at the board. He started writing. He wrote 19 next to the number 19, 53 next to the number 35 and then 88 next to the number 88. When he looked at the board again, he held his breath because the numbers were written in the same handwriting as his. He knew what that meant.

He was the one who told Barrow to kill Kira.


	17. SILVERFINGER

Stella was sitting on the couch, laid back, her arms crossed in front of her chest as her brown eyes were on her uncle who was apparently took a trip down the memory lane. He blinked few times. His head was bleeding because he went to do some crazy shit, putting his life in danger without them. Allison was cleaning the wound while Chris was telling everything he knew about the damn ninjas to the teens sitting across him in his study as he was sitting behind his desk.

“His eyes were glowing” Scott told him, causing Stella to grimace not wanting to remember those firefly yellow eyes. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath before she opened them back again. Her fingers went up to behind of her where she was marked with a backwards number 5. They still didn’t know what the hell that meant.

“There was something almost ritualistic about it” Chris said, blinked his eyes one more time. As he was telling the story, it almost felt like he was living it again, like he was still there in his mind. “Like it was looking right into his soul.”

“That’s the same thing it did to me” Isaac interrupted, raising his eyebrows as he was listening to the Argent.

“That’s what it did to everyone” Allison said, focused on the wound on her dad.

“Not everyone” Scott corrected her, blinked once and then he leaned back. That way he was looking right at Allison. “They only came after the werewolves.”

“Last time I’ve checked, neither I or Lydia was a werewolf, but I remember, vividly, that those ninjas came at me and freeze me to death” Stella argued with frustration, still leaning against the couch she was sitting on. Her eyes were obviously full of emotions, and she was obviously very spooked about the whole ninja attack.

“Anyone with a connection to the supernatural” Chris explained. Allison was almost done with his wound. He was still sitting down on his chair so that she wouldn’t have any problem cleaning it up for him.

Stella’s eyes looked down at her hands. That was the problem. That was the reason why she was avoiding her family.

She was supposed to be an Argent, a hunter and the identity of his father wasn’t supposed to change that. But now she was something she was supposed to be hunting and she didn’t feel like an Argent at all. When she was around her cousin, that feeling was just… Getting stronger, getting worse. The only problem Allison had was that she was constantly falling for werewolves.

Well… she was also seeing a werewolf and not just an any werewolf; a werewolf who tried to kill them a while ago.

She sighed silently, tried to clear the thoughts on her head but she could block them only for the moment when she heard Isaac’s voice. “Then who was the guy they went after in Japan?” he curiously asked, tilting his head to the side looking at Chris.

“A Kumicho. A yakuza boss” Chris answered Isaac. “It was my first gun deal. I was only 18 and it was supposed to be a simple exchange. Except Gerard left out the minor detail of the buyers being yakuza.” He took a deep breath in and gave it out quickly. “He wanted to see if I could adapt in the moment. Testing my ability to improvise.”

“Or your ability to survive” Stella responded, straightening up placing her elbows on her knees.

“The moment the sun went down it was like they just materialized out of the shadows.” As Chris was telling the story, everyone stayed silent listening to him. Stella let the quote ‘Know your enemy’ slide into her brain. “They had swords, not curved like katanas but straight, black steel. Like ninjas.”

“I always hated ninjas” Stella murmured. She rolled her eyes as she was thinking about how she could never watch a movie with ninjas except for maybe the Ninja Turtles and always left the room but now… Unfortunately, she wasn’t going to be able to leave the room when these things show up. She rolled her eyes again, shaking her head and then looked at her uncle and curiously asked. “Anyway, what did they want?” 

“To get to the Kumicho.” Chris told them about the whole gunfight. He mentioned how none of the bullets was able to even scratch them, how the bodies covered with blood were laying on the ground, not moving. He sighed, continued. “They cut down every living thing in their way.”

Isaac’s hand went up to the mark behind his ear. “Did they mark him like they did us?” he asked, his voice came out like a whisper.

“Not exactly.” He told them how the guy’s eyes turned to white and his fangs came out. Ninjas attacked him, slashed his stomach with their swords, making them a shish kebab. He told them how he watched all of this, laying on the ground.

“What was he?” Scott asked, looking at Chris who was leaning against his desk. Allison’s work with cleaning the wound was done.

“I don’t know, but there might be someone who does” Chris answered him. “There were a few others who survived that night. One of them was a man named Katashi. They called him Silverfinger because of an unusual prosthetic. And it looked like he was getting ready to take them all on himself. I’ve known for a while Katashi was in the country. I spent yesterday tracking him down.”

Isaac pointed the wound on Chris’ forehead. “Didn’t look like he wanted to be found” he commented.

“Not particularly, no” Chris reacted, looking back at the werewolf.

Stella rolled her eyes. “You should’ve called us” she argued with frustration. She placed her elbow on the side of the couch and then placed her chin on her palm. Her brown eyes were straightly looking at Chris’ blue eyes as she continued heatedly, sharply. “We could’ve found the guy _together_.”

“You were busy” Chris said, not turning his head so that Allison wouldn’t have any problem putting the bandage on his cleaned-up wound. “I didn’t want to call and worry you.”

Even Allison found herself rolling her eyes at what her father said. Stella licked her lips with frustration once again before she ranted. “Busy with partying, yes” she said, scared and angry at the same time. “By the way, the party got interrupted with those weird ninjas who you apparently hid from me. Just, you know, FYI.”

Even though Scott agreed with Stella, he parted his lips to divert the conversation to the much important parts. “You think he knows what they are?” he questioned, leaning forward on the couch he was sitting on. “Or what they want?”

“Maybe” Chris answered.

Allison put on the last bandage and then walked to the window and leaned against the wall, her hands holding onto the wood. “What if he doesn’t want to talk?” she curiously asked. “What if he doesn’t even remember you?”

Chris stood up from his chair and as they were all watching him, he grabbed the box that was on the edge of the table. He turned the box towards the teenagers around him, and then parted his lips. “He’ll remember this” he confidently stated as he was opening the box. He started lifting up the grey piece of cloth covering the item. Stella stood up and glanced at the thing that was in the box. She held her breath the minute she was it. The masks that those ninjas were wearing… Stella’s breaths got heavier as Chris told them how he broke the mask with a bullet. “I know I didn’t kill it. I’m not sure you can. But I slowed it down, long enough for us to get out of there.”

Stella reached out into the box like Scott and pulled up a piece of the black mask. Her eyes were focused on the thing, viewing the material. “What was behind the mask?” she asked in fear, still looking down on the mask.

“Darkness” Chris responded. “Absolute darkness.”

“Are you okay?” Scott screamed through the loud wind so that the young girl behind him could hear him as they were on Scott’s bike, riding to the school after their meeting with Chris. Allison decided to stay with her dad with Isaac and Stella decided to go with Scott so that they could inform and as they were on the bike, Scott felt her tightened up her grip around his stomach, so he didn’t have to look back to see she was nervous.

He could also feel her loud heart beatings.

“Yeah!” Stella screamed as a response, the engine rising through Scott’s bike was just too loud, so she had to shout a little but also because she was wearing a helmet. She held tighter to Scott so that she wouldn’t fall. “I just… I was just thinking how I need to get myself a new car as soon as possible.” Scott giggled but the only reason she could heart that was because they were pretty much glued to each other on the bike, sitting back to back. “And also… You’re being followed.”

Before Scott was able to ask her what she meant by that, two more expensive bikes on each side appeared. They quickly noticed Aiden and Ethan who were riding their bikes as fast as Scott, right next to him on the road. Young alpha looked at them both for a second and then from the corner of his eyes, he turned to Stella. “Hold on tight!” he ordered.

And he started going a lot faster away from the twins who got faster along him.

Scott parked his bike on the school lot, Stella took a breath and then took out the helmet Scott gave her handing it back to Scott. Meanwhile, Ethan and Aiden approached them and parked their bikes next to Scott’s, one of them on the left and the other on the right. Stella watched their every move and then took a deep breath. She raised an eyebrow and looked at Aiden and Ethan. “You guys going to be doing this all day?” she questioned, she looked a little bit amused as well.

Ethan and Aiden had the exact same smirk on their faces. Aiden was looking directly at Stella, but Ethan’s eyes were on Scott. “All day” he said.

“All night” Aiden continued, smirking as he looked at Stella.

Stella chuckled and rolled her eyes looking back at Aiden, while Scott started talking as his gaze was on the twins, moving on the both of them. “Is this about being in my pack?” he questioned, frowning.

“This is about you being the target of demonic ninjas” Ethan corrected him, tilting his head to the side as he was looking at Scott. Stella’s eyebrows went up, hearing his answer.

Meanwhile twins continued teasing. “You mean the demonic ninjas that pulled swords out of their chests and completely kicked our asses?” Aiden asked sarcastically, turning his head to look at Ethan. The sarcasm in his voice and the facts that were made Stella slightly scoff, shaking her head in disbelief.

“Yeah” Ethan said with the same level of sarcasm. “Those demonic ninjas.”

“I don’t need anyone to protect me” Scott argued, even causing Stella to roll her eyes and turned her whole body to look at Scott.

“I don’t wanna seem like I agree with dog number 1 and number 2 over here, Scott but…” Stella started, rubbing the back of her neck. Ethan rolled his eyes, Aiden just chuckled in disbelief while Scott kept looking at her, listening to her. Stella waggled her eyebrows up and down and continued. “They were looking right at you when the sun came up.”

Scott knew she was right, but he parted his lips confidently. “And they also disappeared” he responded and then looked at Aiden and Ethan. “Argent thinks that they could just come out at night.”

“Since this is our first experience with demonic ninjas…” Aiden said, not really caring about what he said and looked at him. “… we’re thinking we should play it safe.”

“All day” Ethan ended their argument, looking at Scott.

Scott sighed, put the helmets on the bike. “And all night.”

“Okay” Scott breathed out. He put his jacket inside his locker. Aiden and Ethan were standing behind him like a bodyguard, meanwhile Stella was leaned against the locker next to Scott’s, waiting for him to finish. She was exchanging glances with Aiden sometimes, but he was mostly focused on Scott. “One thing first. Stella and I need to talk to Stiles and let him know everything that happened last night. Without you.”

“No” Aiden rejected.

“Yes” Stella fought back. She pushed herself off the locker and looked at the twins with a firm but a relaxed expression. Scott knew Stella got this so as he smiled softly, he was trying to fix his locker and looking for the thing he was trying to find. “And we don’t want you listening in. No wolf hearing.”

“How would you even know?” Aiden asked, confused. His dark flickering eyes and his grin was directed to Stella, waiting for her response as she smiled back meaningfully, giving him the silence answer.

Meanwhile Scott turned around, shut his locker closed and looked at the twins. “I’m a true Alpha” he said with a confident smile. “You have no idea what I can do.”

“You two have kissed?” Scott asked in surprise, not being able to control his volume. Stiles was talking about the reason why he left the party and what happened afterwards when he mentioned this tiny detail which caused Scott to react big time which was understandable yet so not the time and place.

“That’s not really the point here, McCall” Stella responded as she shrugged alongside of Stiles and they entered the chemistry lab together.

Scott nodded. “Yeah, right, sorry” he murmured, obviously still a little surprised but he looked back at his best friend. “So… What happened next?”

“Okay” Stiles heatedly continued. “So, then we start talking about phosphors and the key having chemicals on it, right?” He was obviously nervous and scared which caused Stella to frown, not understanding what was happening. Stiles put his bag on the floor and continued with the story that Stella didn’t know either. “And so that made me think of the chemistry closet and the fact that someone had to let Barrow in…” Stiles stopped, looked at the board. Stella and Scott did the same thing, only to see it cleaned. There was no longer atomic letters and the representative letters next to them. “It’s gone. Okay, it doesn’t matter though.” He turned around and looked at Scott and Stella. “It doesn’t matter. I’ve still got the key.” He quickly went through his keychain, walking near them. “What the hell?” Stiles was surprised to see the key he was looking for wasn’t there anymore. Stella frowned, watching every anxious movement Stiles was making. Scott and she exchanged a look, knowing both of them were worried about their best friend. “I had it. I had it right here. I had it here this morning, I swear to God, I had it this morning.”

“The key you were talking about last night?” Scott questioned curiously.

“Yeah, I showed it to you, right?” Stiles responded, looking at Scott. “Didn’t I show it to you?”

“No, you just told me about it” Scott said, looking at his best friend with a worried expression. “I never actually saw it.”

Stella stepped into the conversation. “I saw it” she said, trying to make him feel better but it was probably going to take a while. “You asked me if it was mine and then I…” She remembered the little key from last night. “Wasn’t it the key that we talked about before we… uh…?”

Scott looked at her. “Kissed?” he said for her.

Stella faked a smile, shook her head slightly. “Thanks” she responded.

Meanwhile Stiles was still in a whole different mental state as he slowly nodded and then walked right past them. “I was here a couple of hours ago” he talked to himself. He walked towards the black board. “And the message left to Barrow spelling Kira’s name was right there on the board in my handwriting and I had the key to the chemistry closet.”

“So, you’re telling us you unlocked the chemistry closet so that Barrow could hide in it from the cops and then you wrote him a message to kill Kira?” Stella repeated, frowning and looking at Stiles. “Stiles, no offense but you are the last person that I could think of when it comes to killing people.”

“I know how it sounds… But look at this.” He pulled out a piece of paper from his pocket and showed it to his friends. “This is the news report that came out about Barrow when they caught him, okay? About the shrapnel bomb that he used. See this? See what he did?” He pointed the article as he continued. “He put nuts, bolts and screws.” Stella thought about the prank they pulled on Coach for his birthday. They’ve done something very similar to this but to Stella, this was just a big fat coincidence. “And then he hid the bomb and the detonator in a box that he wrapped as a birthday present.” He looked up at his friends, and when he spoke again, his voice was higher due to the anxiety. “What does that sound like to you?”

“Coach” Scott responded in shock. Stella knew this answer was the truth but still it was going to make Stiles more anxious, so she just gave out a breath. “The joke we played on Coach.”

“It’s just a coincidence Stilinski” Stella opposed as she was trying to calm Stiles down. She didn’t believe that he was the one who told Barrow to kill Kira in codded message. She looked into his eyes as she continued. “Don’t you remember the things you say about threes?”

“That was my idea” Stiles repeated himself, emphasizing on the word ‘my’ as his hazel eyes were moving on between Scott and Stella like he drank too much energy drink, but it was only because of panic and anxiety state that he was currently in. “You remember? That was my idea. That’s no coincidence. It can’t be.”

“I don’t want to sound like I’m trying to tell you that you’re wrong” Scott started with a soft voice, trying to calm down his friend not agreeing with his theory. “But I don’t think you’re trying to kill people either.”

As they all looked back at the board, Stiles wrinkled up the paper between his hands. “It was here” he murmured. “It was all here.”

“Stilinski, are you feeling okay?” Stella asked, taking an anxious step forward towards Stiles. Her hand softly touched his elbow, looking at his exhausted face and bags underneath his eyes. She frowned in worry, continued. “You’re looking really tired.”

“Yeah, I’m fine” Stiles responded, his eyes still on the board. The news article was wrinkled up between his shaky hands. “I just haven’t been sleeping really.”

Hearing his answer, Stella grimaced. Her eyes found Scott anxiously and then Stiles. “You look like you haven’t slept at all” she reacted, looking at Stiles. Then with a thought, she frowned. “Have you been outside ever since you left the party?” When Stiles didn’t say anything and he just looked at her, she got her answer, causing her to sharply exhale from her nose. “Stiles, I think you should go home and get some rest.”

“Yeah, why don’t you go home?” Scott suggested, agreeing with Stella. “Take a sick day or something.”

When Stiles’ eyes found the blackboard again, Stella softly smiled and touched his elbow again with a comforting expression on her face. “I’ll take you home” she offered calmly.

Scott looked at her. “Are you sure?” he asked. “I thought you have-”

Stella shrugged like it was not a big deal. “I have enough credit to pass my classes anyway” she told him. “It’s okay if I miss couple of them.” Scott nodded, he felt more relaxed now that he knew Stiles wasn’t going to be alone anyway. Stella turned Stiles. “Come on” she murmured softly and as they walked out of the chemistry lab, Scott sighed and looked back at the empty black board.

“Where’s Stella?” Aiden curiously asked when Ethan and he caught up with Scott in the hallways after leaving them alone to talk to Stiles but when they saw him walking by himself, Aiden immediately started looking around not seeing Stella with him.

Scott sighed, seeing the twins again on each side. He parted his lips. “She’s with Stiles” he informed the worried twin. Aiden breathed in, nodded but started thinking about her while Scott continued speaking. “She’s taking him home.”

“Alright, did you tell him?” Ethan asked curiously, changing the subject.

“No” Scott answered with a breath. “He’s got enough on his mind right now.”

“If they’re coming for you in a few hours, then so do you” Aiden said, walking right next to Scott who stopped as he heard what Aiden said and then started thinking and replaying what happened that night in his mind.

“What if it’s not me?” he questioned, causing both of the twins to stop in sync with him and frown with that question in their minds. “What if I’m not the one they want?”

“Who else is there?” Ethan asked looking at Scott, pretty confused. If those evil ninjas weren’t looking at him, then who were they looking at? That’s when Scott turned around and looked at the young girl coming down on the stairs. Aiden frowned when he saw Kira. The thing they didn’t know was that she knew about the whole supernatural world as well.

Meantime, the wheels on Scott’s mind was turning way too fast. He remembered the weird pictures of her with an aura that was around her when there was a flash involved while taking a picture. Kira was there that night. Kira was standing right behind him that night.

She could be the new target.

As Stella finally got a chance to drive the blue jeep, she couldn’t really enjoy the moment since a very tired Stiles was sitting right next to her on the passenger seat. As she was looking at him worriedly from the corner of her eyes, she couldn’t help but think how amazing it was to drive the jeep, even though it was an old car. 

Stella’s eyes went back on the road, taking a deep breath. She wasn’t taking Stiles home; she was taking him to the hospital because he looked awful. And she knew he wasn’t gonna be happy about it, so she decided to distract him. “Hey, uh…” Stiles looked at her with a tired expression. “Do you remember the time when you asked me why me and Allison weren’t sharing a car to school anymore?” Stiles nodded; Stella licked her lips. “How I always call you to pick me up earlier and Allison would drive to school with either Lydia or by herself?”

Stiles nodded once again. “You, uh, you didn’t answer me” he reminded, exhausted. He could barely keep his eyes open but even if he slept, it was only for few minutes so he didn’t even bother to close his eyes as he looked at Stella, continued. “You tried to divert the question with another question.”

Stella tightened her lips, her eyes on the road. “Because I didn’t want to answer” she said with a lower volume than she anticipated. “And I know you guys are talking about it behind me and not brave enough to bring it up but yes… There was something wrong. I…” Stella took a deep breath in and gave it out slowly. “I don’t know, I mean… How can I be an Argent and something supernatural, a banshee, at the same time? It’s just...” She was looking at the road without blinking, her hands on the steering wheel. “I don’t know… wrong.”

“Stella, you are an amazing Argent” Stiles assured her, causing Stella to look at him for a second but then turned back to the road. “I mean, you are an incredible shot. You sometimes scare the crap out of me, to be honest.” Stella chuckled softly. “And I have no idea why you are telling me all this right now.”

Stella smiled softly, parked the car right in front of the hospital and pulled the keys to herself and then she looked at Stiles and parted her lips. “Because I think you should see a doctor and I knew you wouldn’t want that, so I had to distract you a little bit.”

“Dr. Gardner’s not back until next week” Melissa said, looking away from the computer. Her brown eyes found Stella and Stiles as she continued. “Do you want to try waiting for one of the urgent care doctors or…” In the middle of Melissa’s sentence, Stiles felt like the world around him was spinning. Stella quickly made a move to hold him, while Melissa was looking at Stiles with worry in her eyes. Her smile froze on her face as she kept looking at Stiles. A concerned expression creeped in as she stood up. “Stiles?” Stella grabbed him by the arm, helping him to stand up while Melissa worriedly asked. “Are you alright?”

“I don’t know” Stiles murmured; his voice was shaking. As Stella was holding him by the arm, her fingers suddenly touched a vein and Stella could feel how fast his heartbeat was beating. “I guess… I guess not really.”

“Alright, kiddo” Melissa said, grabbing his other arm and started talking with a relaxing voice, trying to calm him down. “Alright, come with me. It’s okay.”

“Blackouts, but not for that long” Stiles said, answering Melissa’s questions after she guided them to a room and asking questions to try to find what was wrong with Stiles. Meanwhile, Stella was sitting on the couch with Stiles’ jacket he took out before he sat on the hospital bed, putting it on her lap. “And sleepwalking, which I used to do a lot as a kid.” Stiles took a glance at the file that Melissa was filling and then looked back at his hands. “Um, also having some really bad anxiety.”

“Panic attacks?” Melissa asked, looking at Stiles who was sitting down next to her.

Stiles nodded, confirming her and took a deep breath, gave it out. “Yeah, a couple” he answered, his hazel eyes moving to Melissa. He gave a pause for a second and then with a thought, he continued. “Oh, and I temporarily lost the ability to read, but that might have had more to do with this giant magic tree and a whole human sacrifice thing.”

Melissa smiled, continued scribing something on her little notepad. “I recall something vaguely about that, yes” she responded with a soft meaning smile, looking at Stiles and Stella and then back to the paper in front of her. “How many hours of sleep are you getting?”

“Eight” Stiles answered.

“A night?”

“In the last three days.” Stella sighed in worry looking at Stiles who was counting his fingers, doing the math, trying to be sure. Stella squeezed the jacket between her hands without even noticing. “Yeah, definitely eight.”

“Been feeling irritable?” Melissa asked, walking to the shelf where they were holding the syringes.

“Yeah, possible to the point of homicide.”

“Inability to focus?” Melissa asked.

“No, the Adderall’s not working.”

“Impulsive behavior?”

“More than my usual?” Stiles said what Stella would say in a normal time but right now, she was too worried to be even sarcastic about it. “Hard to tell.”

“Vivid dreams during the day?” Melissa asked. Stella held her breath with that question. She didn’t know about Stiles, but she was definitely having vivid dreams during the day. That damn hunter, freaking wolf and her dead mother was still keep appearing to her.

“Okay, basically all of the above” Stiles responded as his gaze moved up to her. “Do you know what this is?”

Melissa walked in front of him, nodded softly. “I think so” she said, holding needle.

Stiles anxiously pointed the needle with a head nod. “Uh, what’s that?” he asked. Knowing that he was scared of needles, Stella knew wasn’t that surprised when she heard that question leaving his lips.

Besides, she was curious about what that was as well.

Melissa looked at the needle and then at Stiles. “Do you trust me?” she asked, raising her eyebrows slightly and keeping her gaze on the young man.

“When you’re not holding a needle” Stiles answered, making Melissa slightly chuckle.

Still holding the needle, she rolled up his sleeves, cleaned it with a cotton and then parted her lips to answer his question. “It’s a Midazolam” she said, looking at the needle. Her eyes found Stiles as she continued. “A sedative.” She stuck the needle into Stiles’ arm and then tossed it to the red box, took her white gloves out, put them on the table.

“Why’d you give me a sedative?” Stiles asked, still holding the arm that Melissa stuck the needle into.

“Because you, Stiles, are one profoundly sleep-deprived young man” Melissa explained, looking at him. “You need rest and you need it now. Lie down.”

Stiles nodded okay, while Melissa helped him lie down on the hospital bed. “Okay, how long’s it takes to…” In the middle of his sentence, he felt the sedative took in effect. “Oh… Not long at all.”

Melissa covered Stiles up with a white blanket. “Get some rest” she murmured, brushed his hair back softly.

As she was about to walk away to Stella, they heard Stiles’ soft murmur, holding onto Melissa’s hand. “Thanks mom.” The young woman felt the need to pause for a second after hearing what he just said. She did see him as his son after all those years that he was friends with his son but hearing those words from him… It just broke her heart, knowing he was still grieving after his mother.

Melissa stood near his bedside for a second before she turned to Stella who was looking at Stiles with sadness in realization in her eyes, watching him fall asleep. She was only able to look away when Melissa sat next to Stella on the couch. “Aren’t you supposed to be at school?” she curiously questioned. Her voice came out broken and low with the effect of Stiles calling her mom.

Stella shrugged, took a deep breath in and out and then leaned back. Her eyes moved from Stiles to Melissa as she parted her lips. “I didn’t want to leave him alone” she murmured, feeling tired as well.

“You look exhausted, Stella” Melissa said, examining her face from afar. “Not as bad as Stiles but you look just as awful. What’s wrong?”

“Hallucinations” Stella said underneath her breath. “They keep getting worse and it’s not something I can take medication to stop, so I have no idea what to do.”

“What are your answers to the question I asked to Stiles?” Melissa curiously asked, drawing her eyebrows together as she looked at Stella.

“Well, no to panic attacks” Stella murmured, actually thinking about it. “Blackouts… I’ve had one or two.” She sighed. “Vivid dreams during the day, check. Anxiety, check. Irritability, check.” She shook her head. “Basically, everything except for panic attacks but I am sure if we wait a couple of days, I’ll have them too.”

“You need to rest” Melissa said, determined and worried. “Go home.”

Stella refused, shook her head to both sides. “I can rest here.” Melissa knew there was nothing she could do to change her mind, so she found herself giving her a quick head nod, stepping back and stood up.

She looked at her before she left her and Stiles alone in the room. “If you need help, I can get you a sedative as well” she said, suggesting. Stella shook her head no, Melissa smiled and then walked out the room.

Stella gave out a deep breath from her nose, dropped her hands on the jacket, looked around. And then she laid back, placed her head on the back of the couch, sighed and then hoping she could sleep, she closed her eyes.

Scott was putting his black leather gloves on after putting on his helmet when he heard noises coming behind him. He looked over his shoulder, seeing Aiden and Ethan walking towards him, he couldn’t help but sigh.

When the twins stood next to their bikes, Scott was good to go. “Guys” he said, walking his bike back to get on the road. “I appreciate you wanting to protect me.” Ethan and Aiden put on their helmets on, listening to Scott. “But I have to be alone for a bit.” He ran the engine. “So, sorry about this.”

Ethan and Aiden frowned, trying to start their engines but it wasn’t working.

Meanwhile, Scott was riding his motorbike to Kira who was waiting for him with a smile. He stopped right in front of her, waiting for her to hop on. She put on a red helmet, sat behind Scott. “What do I do with these?” she asked with a smile showing the parts that she took out from Aiden and Ethan’s motorbikes which were the reason that those bikes weren’t working.

Scott smiled, started the engine again. He put down the black glass on his helmet, and as they rode on the road to his house, the things on Kira’s hand fell on the school’s parking lot, leaving them on the ground.

“Could you lock the door?” Scott asked heatedly in a rush, stepping inside his house with Kira behind him. She nodded, confirming him and then quickly walked away to do what she was told to do by Scott. Meanwhile, Scott was making his way to the windows, locking every single one of them up.

Kira locked the door, turning around to look at Scott who was walking one window to another, taking care of them. She nervously connected her hands in front of her, parting her lips. “We’re running out of time” she softly said.

“I know” Scott responded. “But Allison, her dad and Isaac are working on something that could help.” Scott closed down another window and walked towards the other with Kira watching his every move. 

She anxiously gave out a breath. “I don’t want to sound pessimistic or anything, but you really think that’s going to keep them out?” she nervously questioned.

Scott walked towards to young girl. “Actually, we have a kind of security system.” he slightly nodded and walked past Kira to get to another window, checking them if they are locked up or open. “Things happened a couple of weeks ago, a lot of things…” Scott kept walking around in the house in hurry, still talking with Kira. “… and we had my boss help make a few changes to the house.”

“Your boss?” Kira asked, smiling with so much anxiety that it almost looked like she was having a stroke. Everything was happening too fast and she was scared. “Do you work for a security company or something?”

“No, he’s a veterinarian” Scott answered the young girl who started walking behind him in disbelief after hearing his answer, not believing what she was hearing.

She slowly parted her lips, raised her eyebrows up in shock. “You had a vet put in your alarm?”

Scott stopped walking, looking around causing Kira to stop by reflex. “Yeah, sort of” Scott said, grabbing his bag and hanging it on his shoulder. “But I can’t arm it. Only my mom can.”

“Where’s she?”

“Don’t worry” Scott said. “She’ll be here.” They quickly went upstairs to Scott’s room. Young man threw his back onto his bed quickly and then walked to the window near it, pulling it down to close and then locked it like the rest of them. He gave out a breath and as he stepped back, he accidentally hit Kira. He turned around, smiled softly, put his hands on her shoulder. “Oh, sorry.” Then he nervously pulled his hands to himself. Thinking about their situation, he was obviously nervous but that wasn’t the only reason. His eyes found Kira. “We’re going to be okay. I promise” he said softly, trying to calm her down. He knew and sensed how terrified she was, he thought he should do something to ease her mind but telling her and promising her that they will okay was the only thing he could think of.

And then he was thinking about what Stella thought of Kira, what Stiles was feeling about Kira. Neither of them trusted Kira after everything that’s been happened. But then there were his feelings. He somehow knew Kira could be a killing machine, a monster. He knew that, he was aware of the possibility but he refused to believe it when he heard her voice. “We?” Kira asked with a breath. “Or me?”

Scott had to pause with that question and looked at her, knowing the answer, knowing he was going to do everything in his power to keep everyone safe. “All of us” he said.

“You didn’t bring the twins here because you didn’t want them to get hurt” Kira responded but it came more of like a question, raising her eyebrows and looking at Scott.

“I don’t want anyone getting hurt.”

“Then why did you bring me?” Kira asked curiously. “If those things are coming after you, and anyone who gets in the way gets kill, then shouldn’t I be somewhere else?”

“I’m not letting you get hurt” Scott emphasized on his statement, taking a step forward and looking right in Kira’s eyes.

“And I don’t want you getting hurt” Kira said back. “Especially because of me.”

“It could be either of us” Scott told her. All he was trying to do was calm her down, but Kira shook her head to sides, saying no.

“I don’t think so” she said and then continued. “I have to show you something.” She walked to her bag, took something out and sat on the bed. Scott frowned, reading the title on the book. CHINESE MYTHOLOGY. Kira looked up at the young man. “Have you ever heard of something called a kitsune?”

“Hey.” Stella lightly startled when she heard Melissa’s voice coming to her from the door which was slightly open. She was watching the ceiling, trying to sleep when her body peeked in through the door. Stiles was still laying down on the hospital bed, sleeping but Stella wasn’t that lucky. When she heard Melissa’s voice, she pulled herself up and straightened up. “Are you hungry, want some food or, I don’t know, coffee?”

Stella looked at Stiles for a second and then looked at Melissa. “I would never in a million years, eat something from the hospital cafeteria” she told her, talking softly so that she wouldn’t wake Stiles up even though Melissa gave him a sedative.

Melissa softly chuckled. “We order take-outs” she assured her. Stella shrugged, not feeling really hungry. Melissa was looking at her, worried about her. “Chinese?” Stella shrugged again. Melissa smiled. “Okay, get some sleep. I’ll stop by again to bring you food and some coffee, okay?”

“Okay” Stella murmured, rubbing her eyes. Melissa knew she wasn’t fine but didn’t do anything or say anything. She simply smiled and left her alone. As she closed the door behind her and stood in front of the door, she sighed and reached for Stiles’ file right next to her on the wall. She looked at what she wrote, frowned. She looked at the symptoms, holding a highlighter pen.

\- Hallucinations.

\- Impulsiveness

\- Irritability

\- Insomnia

She highlighted those words and as she took a deep breath, she walked to the room where they were keeping the old files. She checked her back over her shoulder, making sure she was in alone in the room and then continued doing what she came here to do.

She grabbed an old patient’s file. Claudia Stilinski. Stiles’ mother.

She compared the things she highlighted with the things that was written in her file. “Patient is irritable, impulsive. Complaints of vivid dreams. Inability to distinguish between fantasy and reality” she read, shook her head and looked back at Stiles’ file. “Acute insomnia.” She closed her eyes, taking a deep breath. When she opened them back, she closed Claudia’s file which was marked with DECEASED IN 2004 on it.

As Kira opened the bookmarked part on the book, Scott sat right next to her. There were pictures of white foxes on the pages, Scott pointed one of them. “That looks like what happened to you at the power station” he said, looking at her.

Kira nodded, parted her lips. “When a kitsune rubs its tails together, it can create fire or lighting” she responded, explaining the picture Scott was looking at. “It’s called foxfire.” There was a moment of silence in the room, Kira softly chuckled as she broke the silence. “I don’t have any tails.”

Scott laughed nervously. “How’d you know what I was thinking?” he asked as nervous as he could be.

“Because…” Kira said, stretching the word for the fun of it. She shrugged. “… Kitsunes are also psychics. I can hear all of your thoughts.” Scott was looking at Kira, he was extremely nervous hearing what Kira has said but then he heard her laughter. She sounded like she was enjoying his situation. “Just kidding.” Scott laughed, letting a soft ‘oh’ between his lips. But then Kira’s smile froze on her face. “The sun’s setting.”

“Yeah, I know” Scott said, his voice came out like a soft whisper. His eyes moved up from the window to the young girl next to her who was sitting way closer than they both intended to. He softly exhaled, looking at her. “Are you scared?”

“Not right now” Kira answered him softly. Scott leaned in lightly towards Kira, who was looking down at her hands. Not like she didn’t like Scott. She liked him a lot. That was why she was a nervous wreck. She was also thinking about everything else that’s been going on. “I’m supposed to be back before dinner.”

“Tell them you can’t make it” Scott whispered.

“What should I say?” Kira whispered back.

“Say, uh, you’re going on a date” Scott said with a light grin on his voice.

“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Kira was looking at Scott with a smile. “You know, foxes and wolves don’t get along.” Kira flipped a page over, revealing a page that had a picture of a white fox and a black wolf on it. They were getting ready to fight but Scott didn’t give a damn and closed the book, causing Kira to look at his face.

“That’s just a drawing in a children’s book.” Kira and Scott started to lean in towards each other but right when their lips were about to touch, Scott heard a car parking on the garage way, looked at the window. “My mom’s here” he announced.

They stood up from the bed together in synch, went downstairs to welcome Melissa but the minute they took the last step down, they realized that it wasn’t his mother. It was Scott’s father, Rafael McCall.

Scott raised his eyebrows, looking at his father. “What are you doing here?” he questioned in disbelief. “And why do you still have a key?”

Rafael waggled his eyebrows, amused by the situation. “Funny you mention keys” he responded, walking towards the computer. “Because while I have a key to this house, I’m not exactly sure how you got a key to my office.” He opened the computer, showing them a picture. This was taken the day when they sneaked into the police station to get Kira’s phone but couldn’t delete the pictures because her phone was dead, and they used the computer to charge it.

Apparently, the computer had its own security system and they got caught red handed.

The guy was watching the security footage live on his tablet, his lips pressed against one another with anger and frustration. One of his guys got punched, he swiped right to another camera. The same image, he swiped again. The same image. Another one of his men got punched, knocked out, fell on the ground.

He slammed his tablet on the desk, took out his gun and aimed at the door. That’s when a stranger came in with one of his men between his arms and also holding a gun in the other hand. He stepped into the room, dropped the man on the ground and his blue steel eyes found the guy. “All I want to do is talk” Chris said, his gun pointing at Katashi, aka the Silverfinger and took a step forward.

“Taking out my security is not what I would call a good conversation starter” Katashi responded. Chris took another step thinking how it was a great call not bringing Stella here. Her temper wouldn’t do much help to them with this guy.

“You don’t remember me, do you?” Chris asked and continued without breaking his eye contact with Katashi. “Allison, take the man’s gun.” That’s when Allison came in with a chain she was holding. She threw it to the guy, still holding one end and watched the other end of the chain wrap around his gun. She pulled the chain to herself, the gun left Katashi’s hands leaving him weaponless. Chris kept looking at him, parting his lips. “Now, can we talk?”

Then Isaac’s voice reached to them, filling up the empty room. “Guys!?” Chris turned around, looked at the entry seeing Isaac walking inside with a huge man behind him. His claws were on Isaac’s neck in a threatening way. “They have a werewolf too.”

“Let me help you out here” Rafael started talking when he saw the teenagers across him was just standing there, not explaining anything. “This kind of thing usually begins with something along the lines of, ‘It’s not what you think’ or ‘I can explain’ or something like that.” Scott didn’t say anything. His brown eyes found the window, seeing the sun setting down what felt like faster than usual. They were running out of time and his dad needed to get out of the house as soon as possible so that he wouldn’t get hurt by something he didn’t understand.

“Dad, let me help you out” Scott said, using his words against him. As he and Kira took a step towards the table that had the computer on it, he parted his lips, keeping his eyes on him. “You need to leave.”

“I will” Agent McCall said, nodding and looking at his son. “With a satisfactory explanation.”

“Go get a warrant” Scott argued, looking directly at his father. His heart started beating faster with the way he was feeling nervous and anxious because of what was going to happen the minute it was dark and night.

“I don’t need a warrant!” he responded to his son. “I’m your father!”

“No, you’re a gene donor” Scott responded back with a much calmer voice, despite of his father’s. “I got my hair color from you. And that’s all I got. So, you’re not allowed to play tough dad with me.”

That’s when Melissa walked in on them with a frown, trying to understand what was happening, second time since Rafael came back to town. “Hey” she said, standing next to Rafael and looking at her son. “What’s going on?”

“Maybe one of you should explain” Rafael responded as his eyes were moving between Scott and Kira. But before even they could start talking, the sun went down. It was dark, and their time was up.

“Scott” Kira murmured with fear in her eyes and his voice, looking at Scott and trying to get his attention. His brown doe eyes looked outside the window, definitely with fear and anxiety in his eyes and confusing Rafael about what was happening.

And then he saw something, a silhouette behind his son. He gasped with fear. “Who the hell is this?”

Following his dad’s eyes, Scott saw who he was looking at. His lips parted open in fear, holding his breath. “Dad, no!” he shouted but Rafael started walking with his gun in his hands. “Dad, wait!” Everything happened so fast. Ninja pulled up a sword out of his chest, and then thrust it right into Rafael’s body, causing him to fall onto his knees and Kira to scream. “Dad!” Scott’s eyes opened widely, running to his father followed by his mother Melissa.

And then the door opened. Melissa hearing the voice looked at the door and before seeing Derek come in and roar, she pulled Rafael to another room, trying to keep him safe and put pressure on his wound while Scott and Derek roared, attacking the ninja. “Mom, the ash!” Scott screamed after saving himself from a sword swing. Kira was in the corner, watching everything that’s been happening with fear and then she felt something behind her. She turned around to see an evil ninja looking at her.

That’s when the twins broke the window down, shattering them to the floor and falling on their knees in the middle of the living room. They glowed their eyes blue, roared causing the ninjas to turn to them and pulled their swords in the air in an attack position.

As the fight was going on in full speed at the McCall house, Melissa was waiting for them to kick the ninjas out before she completed their special security system. And when it happened, when they were outside the door, Scott looked at his mom. “Mom, now! Do it now!” he yelled. Melissa quickly put the mountain ash in front of the door, locking the house down for the supernatural.

Kira walked towards the door, now knowing Ethan was watching her and put her hand up, tried to touch the air but her hand was pushed away by an invisible blue force. As she gasped in shock, Ethan frowned, knowing no supernatural being was able to touch that thing.

“You know what they are, don’t you?” Chris asked, putting the broken black ninja mask in front of Katashi, on the table. Katashi gestured his werewolf to let go off Isaac and then put the broken pieces of the mask together like it was puzzle pieces.

“They’re called oni” he told him. “They are demons. And they are unstoppable.”

“What does work on them?” Allison asked, frowning. “How do we stop them?” She was worried for her cousin, for her friends and especially for Scott because she knew those ninjas, onis, whatever they were called was looking at Scott when the sun came up at the loft.

“Nothing” Katashi responded. “At least no man-made weapon.” He lifted his head up, looked away from the broken mask and looked at Chris. “The oni are a force of nature. You don’t fight a tsunami. You endure it. And you hope that you’re not destroyed in his path.”

“Then, how do we endure it?” Allison asked this time.

“One of you already has” Katashi said before he made his way towards Isaac. He softly twisted his ear, enough for them to see the mark behind it. “This is Japanese kanji for _self_.” He turned his head to look at Chris and Allison. “This means he is still himself.” He let go off Isaac’s ear and then continued. “The oni are looking for one who is no longer themselves.”

“What do you mean no longer themselves?” Chris asked curiously, frowning, and looking directly at Katashi.

“Possessed” he replied. “By a dark spirit.”

“All of the baseboards are ash wood?” Derek questioned as he was looking at the ‘Hello’ doormat on the ground.

Scott nodded, looking around. “Uh, yeah” he answered. “It was Deaton’s idea.” His brown eyes found Derek, frowned, remembering something. The glimpse of Derek busting in from the door played in his mind as he parted his lips. “And where the hell did you come from?”

“I’ve been following you” Derek responded.

“For how long?” Scott asked in shock.

Before Derek walked past Scott and made his way to the twins and Kira, he looked at Scott and parted his lips. “All day.”

“Stella.” As she heard her name echoing through the room with a bad, horrifying and raspy accent, she gasped. She startled, jumped on her spot and then realized her eyes were closed. She opened her eyes with a sudden reflex. But the minute she realized where she was, she held her breath in shock, looking around. She was back in the white room with the magical tree Nemeton in front of her. She gulped down as her heart started pounding in her chest with fear and anxiety. This had to be a dream. She couldn’t even remember falling asleep but there couldn’t be any other explanation. It didn’t feel like a hallucination. It felt more like a… She didn’t know… It felt like a dream that she couldn’t wake up from. “Stella!” She startled again, jumping on her spot. It was an unfamiliar voice. It was a scary voice, talking like swallowing some words. “STELLA!”

Her heartbeats got faster, unsteady, higher than normal. Her lips were shaking with fear. Her breathings got heavier. She turned around, looked around, not seeing anything. She was alone in the room, all alone in this huge white room. “Who are you?!” She let out small gasps in fear, still looking around. “What do you want from me?!”

She needed Allison. She needed her cousin so much in that moment. Her voice was shaking as she was speaking, her hand went to her gun, but it wasn’t there. Nothing was. It was just her. Just her, all alone in the scary white room...

She swallowed hard when she heard the voice again, echoing through the room. “Let me in Stella” the creepy voice responded, freaking the hell out of Stella once again. She closed her eyes shut; she was terrified. Her chest started moving with the heavy and shallow breaths she was taking in. She wanted the voice to stop talking but it kept going. “You can’t run away from this. There is no escape.” Stella shook her head to both sides, refusing the open her eyes. And then she felt the wind and the breath on her face. Without even opening her eyes, she knew whoever was talking was right in front of her, nose to nose. So close that she could feel its breath on her face. She sobbed in fear, her shoulders moving.

She didn’t open her eyes to find out if she was right, shaking her head to both sides as she whimpered in fear. “No, no, no, no” she cried, keeping her eyes close shut.

“It’s gonna be either you or someone very close to you” the voice continued, still standing too close to her. “You can’t reject me, Stella.” It raised the volume of its voice and then shouted angrily. “I will get my revenge!” But then it went silent. Stella kept her eyes closed, feeling her heart was pounding out of her chest. Tears rolled down from her eyes as he moved her hands up to her head, pressuring her skull as she begging herself to wake up. “Think about it.” Stella startled, tears forming in her closed eyes when the voice was echoed in the room once again. She felt like she was going to explode as the creepy voice continued. “Think about it, Stella” it said. Stella didn’t know where it was but she was not sure that it was no longer standing in front of her. She couldn’t feel its presence as he continued talking. “We can kill every single person who never knew how much you actually worth. We can kill everyone, one by one, whoever thought you weren’t good enough for anything. Together.” A sick laughter echoed through the white room. “All you need to do is answer this simple question.”

“Leave me alone!” She screamed, opening her eyes. The whiteness and the light in the room was too much for her eyes for a second but then she adjusted and noticed a door ahead. She kept breathing shallowly. She looked around but couldn’t see the source so, without thinking, she started running to the door fast but no matter how much and how fast she ran, the door stayed in the same distance. Stella stopped on her spot, panting and looking at the black door in the white room far away and then she realized something. It was slightly ajar. _A door to your minds. You need to close that door as soon as possible or…_ Deaton’s voice filled up in her mind, remembering. She gulped down, took a short and half breath in. She was still in her place, not being able to move.

“We can kill them, Stella, one by one” the voice repeated. She gasped in fear, wiping a tear that left her brown eyes. “Just answer this question.” She started breathing heavily. “Everyone has it, but no one can lose it. What is it?” Stella closed her eyes again and then she heard another voice. Someone else’s voice… Talia Hale’s voice…

“Embrace your powers” she said with a calm but a tough voice, cutting through the spooky voice. What she’s said was somehow a suggestion and an order at the same time. Stella tried to relax. She could hear the spooky voice in the background but as she took a deep breath in, she felt that voice slowly started to disappear. She opened her eyes when she heard Talia once again. “Scream, Stella. Scream!”

Stella’s hands dropped to her sides from her hair, parted her lips and let out the loudest scream yet. She heard the door across her closed shut with a loud bang and she jumped on the couch she was sleeping on, opening her eyes, and finally being able to wake up. Stiles’ jacket fell onto the ground from her grip. Stella let out a strong and deep breath, looking around. Her hair was wet, her face was covered in sweat.

As her eyes found Stiles who was still sleeping on the bed, she exhaled a deep breath thinking about the dream… nightmare.

“It’s Kira, right?” Ethan asked, looking at the girl who he was standing next to curiously. He was wondering what she was as he noticed she couldn’t get through the mountain ash the way they couldn’t. His eyes were on Kira, watching her slightly nod her head. He continued with another question. “You going to tell us what you are?”

“What?” Kira asked back in confusion, being nervous was causing her to speak a lot faster than she intended to. “What do you mean?”

He let out a soft chuckle and quickly grabbed her hand and pulled her towards the window, turned his head to look at Aiden. “Hey, Aiden, watch.” Aiden looked at them, crossing his arms in front of his chest. Ethan dragged Kira’s finger to the window, same thing happened. With a blue light of force, Kira quickly pulled her hand to herself. “See that?” he said quickly as Aiden slid his phone into his pocket, walked towards Kira. Ethan sounded angry because he didn’t know what Kira was and she could be anything. She could be the reason why those ninjas were after them and Ethan saw her as a threat. “She can’t go through it either.” Ethan looked back at Kira who was moving on her spot nervously knowing the twins’ attention was fully on her. “So, what are you?”

“She’s a kitsune, idiot” Derek answered for Kira, walking towards the twins. “Use your eyes. You can see it all around her.” He stood near them, looking at them. “The younger ones give off an aura. She just hasn’t learned how to conceal it yet.” His gaze moved to Kira. “She probably doesn’t know what kind she is either.”

“There are 13 kinds of kitsune” Katashi said, pacing up and down in the empty room. “Celestial, wild, ocean, thunder… But there is one…” Katashi stopped walking, looked at his audience who were Chris, Allison and Isaac. “… A dark kitsune. They call it void. Or Nogitsune.” He stopped for a while, took a breath in, and then continued. “Nogitsune draws its power from pain and tragedy, strife and chaos.”

“I wasn’t going to hurt her” Ethan said, looking at Derek as he stood next to him in the living room like a bodyguard to Scott.

“Not yet” Derek responded to him without any other expression, waiting on alert with his arms folded before his chest.

Ethan chuckled in disbelief. “Why do you think we’re here, Derek? For a study group?” he argued back with frustration. He kept looking at him as he continued. “We’re here to protect Scott.”

“We’re trying to fight for him” Aiden said, supporting his brother.

“I’m sure you are” Derek nodded and then looked at the twins. “I’m sure you’d kill for him.” He crossed his arms in front of his chest again before asking the real question here. His eyes locked on the twins. “But are you willing to die for him?”

“I wish I could give you the answer you need, Mr. Argent” Katashi continued. “I owe you more than my life. I owe you my honor.” Chris stood up from the chair he was sitting on, once again, remembering how he wasn’t actually getting up to fight against the onis that night. He was getting ready to run away. “I will you tell you one thing, however.” Katashi looked at Chris. “If there is a Nogitsune among you, let the oni destroy it.” His eyes found Allison for a split second but went back to Chris. “Even if it’s your own daughter, or niece.” Allison, Chris and Isaac frowned at the same time and looked at each other in confusion when Katashi mentioned Stella’s name. They didn’t know why he brought her up since she wasn’t here but no one dared to say anything about it but they all knew one thing and that was that she was already marked.

Stella wasn’t the Nogitsune.

“Is Stella still at the hospital?” Ethan asked, watching Aiden walk towards them after leaving them alone to call Stella. He slid hid phone back into his pocket and then stood next to Scott, his eyes on the onis who were outside the mountain ash circle. 

Aiden nodded, looked at his brother for a split second. “Yeah, I told her we are good here and she shouldn’t come here” he quickly summarized their 10-minute conversation. Derek and Scott looked at Aiden, nodded but then got distracted with a sound. One of the ninjas started hitting the barrier with its sword. The house got shaken like an earthquake for a second with the sudden hit, due to how powerful this mountain ash barrier was.

“What are they doing?” Scott asked, frowned.

“Testing for weaknesses” Aiden took a guess, looking at Scott. His voice was worried but also sarcastic. Two ninjas hit the barrier again, causing the plates on the counter to fall to the ground and crack. “Guys?” He looked around and then back to the ninjas which were almost managed to break down the barrier. “We have a problem.”

Ethan shook his head, not looking at Aiden but parted his lips slowly. “I guess, you lied to Stella when you said we are okay here” he commented softly. “Not a good way to start the relationship, brother.”

“Shut up” Aiden told him and then they all got ready to fight. 

Stella let out a breath after ending the call with Aiden in front of the wending machines and then went back to the room, sat back on the couch. Her brown eyes found sleeping Stiles. As far as Aiden told her, Scott and the others were fine and she didn’t have to go there to help them but she wasn’t that relaxed about it. Her fingers went up to the mark behind her ear and then her phone buzzed with a new message from her cousin, Allison.

She sighed, opened the message. Her breathings were still heavy and irregular because of the dream, but she tried to calm herself down, and started reading it. In the text, Allison was talking about how those evil ninjas were called onis and they were looking for a bad spirit, a kind of kitsune called Nogitsune. Apparently, the mark they were leaving meant ‘self’ in Japanese and it only showed that the person was themselves and not the possessed person.

Stella knew she had to relax a bit, knowing she was already marked but she didn’t feel any kind of relaxation at all. She wasn’t fine or comfortable as she was sitting on the couch. She thought about the dream. The voice’s said ‘ _it is either going to be you or someone close to_ _you_ ’ in a very spooky way. Stella gulped down and without her will, her eyes moved up to Stiles who was still laying down on the bed, sleeping.

Stella grabbed tight to Stiles’ hoodie on her lap and sighed, rested her head back on the couch and tried to shut down her brain as she closed her eyes and tried to go back to sleep.

An hour later, Stiles straightened up from the bed and looked around to see the empty room that he was in. His eyes found his red jacket but Stella was nowhere to be seen. He was almost sure she was still there. Somewhere along his sleep and dreams, he felt like he heard a scream but he wasn’t sure and at the time, he was feeling so awake and so well rested that he couldn’t even bring himself to think about it.

He pushed the blanked off him and stood up, walked outside the room. “Stella?” he called out and he looked the other side. “Melissa?” The corridor was empty as well. He started walking down the hallway, trying to see someone but then he found himself stepping into another room. It was dark. He stood in the middle of the room and when he heard some noises around him, he quickly turned around and saw the onis.

Even though he tried to escape it at first, he got stopped by another. They trapped Stiles as they circled him. One of them intended to pull its hand up in the air and to Stiles’ cheek but Stiles quickly grabbed it, stopping him and then twisted to the wrong direction. And then suddenly, he put his other hand into its chest. The yellow glow disappeared around it when he pulled his hand to himself because the oni also disappeared.

Stiles opened his palm to see a crashed firefly. The onis took a step back, Stiles turned around to look at them.

And then, all of a sudden, two of them jumped on him.

Stella was walking fast towards the reception but had to stop when she saw Agent McCall being carried on a stretcher, blood all over him. She saw Melissa and Scott, looking at him, worried about him. Even though she wasn’t on good terms with Agent McCall and she knew what happened from Aiden just few minutes ago, she was wondering if Rafael was okay or not. Also knowing Kira and Scott were clean, she couldn’t stop thinking about something else.

When she left the room to talk to Aiden and find out what happened, Stiles was still in the room sleeping. After her conversation with Aiden over the phone, getting the updates, she felt the need to go to the bathroom but when she came back to the room that she felt him in, Stiles was nowhere to be seen. She walked through the hallways, hoping there was someone who’s seen him but she couldn’t find him anywhere.

And even though she was worried about Agent McCall, her priority was finding Stiles.

“Scott,” She quickly shouted as she speedily walked towards the alpha with worry in her eyes and in her voice. She watched him look at her so she quickly continued. “Stiles is gone.” She shook her head. “I can’t… I couldn’t find him anywhere.”

Before even Melissa could ask the question in her expression, Scott sighed and looked at his mother. “I’ll find Stiles” he told her and softly touched Stella’s elbow to gesture her to follow him.

They started walking fast in the hallways, trying to find their friend.

After a while of walking, Stella stopped with a feeling causing Scott to stop alongside her. He frowned, looking at her. “Did you feel something?” he asked but Stella put up her finger, telling him to shut up and then made her way to that one door next to them.

Stella opened the door, walked inside to see Stiles standing in the middle of the room looking at one spot. “Stiles?” Stella calmly called out, taking few steps towards him. “You okay?”

Hearing her voice, Stiles snapped out of his trance and turned around to face his friends with an expression that Stella couldn’t name but somehow… Stella sighed as she watched him form a rested expression on his face like everything was okay. “Yeah, fine” he responded with a normal voice. He didn’t sound exhausted anymore. “What’s been going on?” Stiles walked towards them, put his hand over Scott’s shoulder. Scott believed that everything was okay but there was something that was bugging Stella out.

And then she noticed the dead firefly on the ground. She didn’t have any time to kneel down and look at it up closely. She swallowed hard, her brain picking up its pace again alongside of her heart.

She followed Stiles and Scott out of the room.


	18. RIDDLED

Stella was trying to calm herself down as she was driving to school in her new car in the middle of the night because Aiden and she had some plans. Well, Stella wouldn’t exactly call it a plan. She wanted a distraction, so she wanted to try something new for the art class, so she asked Aiden to model for her. He jumped to the opportunity to spend more time with her; he was extremely happy with the idea. And few days after Stiles’ incident at the hospital, they promised each other to meet at the school because Stella knew it was going to be empty and they weren’t going to be bothered by anyone.

And now Stella was in her new black Audi A3, driving to the school with a disturbing feeling in her stomach that was making her uncomfortable and unease. But Aiden or the fact that she was going to see him after everything… it wasn’t the reason of it. She wasn’t trying to calm herself down because of it or the fact that they were going to trespass to the school lot didn’t bother her at all.

No, that was something Stella was used to from her life in New York. The problem was a little different than that. And maybe more disturbing than the thought of committing another crime, this time in Beacon Hills.

Ever since she saw that dead firefly and had that dream back in the hospital, her whole body was on a red alert, like something really bad was going to happen. She knew that her ajar door to her mind was finally closed, but she still felt like she was on the edge, like nothing was fixed and in fact, things were actually going to get worse. Something wasn’t right, something was extremely wrong and since there was nothing that she could actually touch or put her finger on, Stella was super nervous for the last couple of days because of the things she didn’t know.

She sharply exhaled, letting out a loud breath between her nose in distress as she parked her car on the school parking lot, but she didn’t attempt to get out of her vehicle for a while. She just sat inside with her hand on the back of her neck. Her foot was tapping the floor repeatedly, feeling extremely nervous. he was chewing her lower lip as her hand reached out to the key, turned it over and stopped the engine. Even though it was silent in the car, she could almost hear the wheels spinning in her brain. She could hear the voices in the back of her mind. Voices that sounded so familiar, but she just couldn’t figure out. The main topic was how they were lost and how they didn’t know how they got there. Stella couldn’t shake off the feeling that it was actually Stiles…

She shut her eyes closed, tried push the voices and everything down. Her feet kept moving, tapping the ground next to the pedals nervously while she did nothing to rescue her lip from her teeth. As her heart started beating faster inside her chest, she opened her eyes and speedily reached out for her bag on the passenger seat. She grabbed her phone, pulled it out and put the bag back on the seat.

She quickly found Stiles’ name from the speed dial and called him up. “Hey” his voice said. Right when Stella took a deep breath and began to say it was stupid for her to call him this late and that she was sorry… the voice continued, revealing herself that it was actually a voicemail. “This is Stiles and you missed me. Leave a message.” Stella let out a curse underneath her breath as she kept chewing her lip. She ended the call and sighed. She licked her lips nervously, looked around. As she gave out a sharp breath from her nose, she reached for the door handle and leaving her bag in the car, she climbed out of the car just with her phone. Locked the doors and slid her phone into her back pocket.

She made her way into the school hallways, and then to art room where Aiden was waiting for her, but she couldn’t ignore the anxiety rising inside her with every step she took.

A soft Jaz music was playing over the radio in the classroom that Aiden and Stella were in. Aiden was sitting on a tool, Stella was behind the canvas, trying to draw lines of her portrait of the young man who tilted his head down like he was telling her that it was enough which caused him to lose his pose. Stella sighed. “I said hold still” she murmured, keep sketching to the canvas in front of her with a black pencil.

“Are we even allowed to be here this late?” Aiden questioned, getting back in his pose once again. Stella smiled, knowing it wasn’t what Aiden had in mind when he agreed to be her model for this. She just knew it. “What if security catches us?”

Stella chuckled. “I thought you liked dangerous stuff Aiden” she murmured, looking at Aiden behind her lashes. Aiden smiled shook his head, rolling his eyes while Stella continued to speak, her eyes on the canvas. “Besides…” She said underneath her breath. “There’s no security.” She was looking at the painting in front of her. “The number of homicides in this school has seen to it that no sane person will ever take a night job here again.”

“So, we’re all alone?” Aiden asked with a childish hope in his raspy and low voice, making Stella laugh. She felt something tingling inside her but kept it as a secret as Aiden put his elbows on his knees, leaning into it, losing his pose again with his signature, cocky grin on his face.

Stella raised an eyebrow, looking at Aiden. “You are losing the pose again” she responded as she shook the pen between her fingers. She wasn’t going to lie that she was kind of turned on right now but messing with him was a lot more fun.

Okay, maybe not… Definitely not but still…

Aiden sighed. “You know, when you said you wanted me to model for you, this wasn’t what I thought you had in mind” he argued, looking at Stella who tilted her head slightly and kept looking at the picture, instead of the young man.

“Oh, really?” Stella asked sarcastically, trying to see if everything was right with her painting and the lines. She was very perfectionist when it came to things like that but as she lifted her head up and looked away from the canvas to Aiden, she slowly raised her eyebrows. “What did you have in mind, then?” Aiden smirked, pulled his green shirt up from his body, taking it off and then getting back to its pose. Stella had to bite her lip to keep herself from smiling. She licked her lips and parted them to speak up. “You know… If you’re thinking nude modeling, it’s usually done without the pants.” She tried to focus back on the painting but when she heard Aiden unzipping his pants, her brown eyes opened widely. And when Aiden threw his pants somewhere above Stella’s hand and looked at her with a grin, Stella had to press her lips tightly to each other to block her smiling. Aiden’s fingers went down to his boxer, getting ready to lose them too but then slowly changed his mind.

He walked up to her, grinning causing Stella to stand up, causing the little chair to fall down. As she watched him come closer, her heart started pounding in her chest with desire. “I think it’s time for a little break” he said and stood in front of the young girl, wearing only his boxers. He looked down at her due to his height. His grin turned into a deep smirk while they were just looking into each other’s eyes. 

Stella didn’t think twice as she needed that distraction more than ever now.

She quickly went up on her tiptoes and put her hands around his neck and pulled him closer and then quickly pressed her lips onto his, kissing him passionately and in so much need. Aiden’s hands traveled to her waist, holding her hardly. He stepped forward, forcing her to step back and didn’t stop until she was between himself and the wall. His hands moved on her ass and then her hair and on her back while Stella’s hands were mostly on his hair and on the back of his neck. She was happy to realize she wasn’t hearing the voices in her mind anymore; she was relieved and then there was just silent.

But right when Aiden took off her shirt and left her with a black, lacy bra and his hands traveled to her legs to lift her up between his muscular body and the wall, Stella’s lips stopped moving on his lips, her smile faded away causing him to stop as well to see if everything was okay.

But as far as he could read on Stella’s face, it wasn’t okay.

While they were making out, Stella has started to hear something over the radio that was supposed to just play a soft background music. Her expression faded away, leaving an empty and confused look on her face as her hands dropped down from Aiden’s neck. He stepped back to give her her space and kept looking at the girl who looked confused as hell in her jeans and just a bra with her messy hair and swollen pink lips. Her eyes were on the radio as she could hear something, the same voice that was playing over and over again in her mind back in the car. Sound of voices were speaking indistinctly. She gulped down, parting her lips with fear, her eyes on Aiden. “You hear that?” she asked with a whisper.

“Hear what?” Aiden asked back as a response. His cocky grin was now long gone, leaving its place to confusion, worry and curiousness.

“You don’t hear that?” Stella questioned, full of fear in her voice.

“I hear music” he said, pointing the radio with his head and then looked back at the young girl, frowned. “What do you hear?”

“Voices” Stella whispered, looking at the radio.

“I don’t know where I am” the voice said, causing Stella to startle. Stella was sure now. It was Stiles. She had to gulp down but there was a lump in her throat. “Please, come find me.” His voice came out shaky and as Stella was trying to breath, the anxiety started to rise up quickly.

When the door to Stiles’ room suddenly opened up, Lydia, Stella and Aiden quickly turned their heads to look at Scott and Isaac who just busted inside with hurry in their actions as well. While they were surprised to see them here all together, Stella and Aiden felt the same thing with Lydia as well. When they arrived at the Stilinski house with Aiden driving super-fast to get here, full dressed up, Lydia was already there. Apparently, she was listening to music on her phone while studying and then she heard the same things Stella did and drove her as fast as she could.

Her house was a lot closer to Stilinski’s than the school so she was able to arrive before Stella and Aiden did. 

“How did you know?” Scott asked quickly and anxiously. His brown eyes were moving on between Stella and Lydia. He was worried about his best friend, thinking about their phone call only few minutes ago. “Did he call you too?”

Both of them shook their heads no. “We heard it” Lydia answered for the both of them, looking at Scott the way Stella was. No one was surprised to see him and Isaac together in here since they knew they were kind of housemates right now. Isaac had nowhere else to stay because of things that happened between him and Derek and he went to Scott who let him stay in the McCall house. Right now, he was glad he was there. So, no one said anything about it as they were focused on stiles.

“Don’t ask” Aiden responded, stepping in when he saw the confused faces of Scott and Isaac as they were looking at Stella and Lydia. His brown gaze was on the alpha and the Beta as he continued. “It gets more confusing when you ask.”

“Not as confusing as this” Stella whispered, looking around in Stiles’ room. There were red strings everywhere and all of them were pointed at one spot on the room: Stiles’ bed… Every string was eventually pulling up to the middle of blue sheets from the pictures on his board and from his table.

“He uses red for unsolved cases” Lydia explained with a soft voice.

“Maybe he thinks he’s part of an unsolved case?” Aiden commented. He’s never been a fan of Stiles and he knew it was a mutual feeling and the only reason he was currently here was because of Stella. Because he saw the terror and the concern in her brown eyes.

“Or is an unsolved case” Isaac added. Stella started biting her inner cheek, walking around the room, her fingers moving up on the red strings. She took a deep breath, she knew something was wrong, aside from the fact that Stiles was nowhere to be seen or found.

“Hold on” Lydia said all of a sudden, looking at Isaac and Scott. Meanwhile, Aiden put his hand on Stella’s shoulder to calm her down, both of them looking at Lydia the way Isaac and Scott were. Stella sighed, she felt like she was holding her breath and she wasn’t able to let it go until they found Stiles, but she had to admit, knowing Aiden was there, she felt better. “Is he still out there? You don’t know where he is?”

“He said he was in an industrial basement somewhere” Scott responded as he was looking back at Lydia.

“We came here to get a better scent” Isaac added.

“What else did he say?” Stella asked anxiously, her heart was beating a lot faster than normal and her hands were starting to shake with anxiety. She had to calm down to think straight but she couldn’t stop thinking about Stiles and how much of a danger he might have been in.

“Something’s wrong with his leg” Scott answered, looking at the young girl. “It’s bleeding.”

“And he’s freezing” Isaac added once again, being the other one who heard the conversation due to his supernatural hearing, causing Stella to sigh anxiously once again.

“Tonight’s the coldest night of the year” Aiden interrupted them, frowned. His eyes moving on the people in the room. “It’s going to drop into the 20s.”

“What did his dad say?” Stella continued with her questions curiously, looking directly at Scott and Isaac who were now looking at each other with guilt. There was this awkward silence that nearly answered the question for them.

Scott decided to break it but looked uneasy. “We kind of… We didn’t tell him yet” he answered as he stuttered.

Stella and Lydia looked at each other and then back to Scott in disbelief. Lydia quickly parted her lips while Stella kept staring at them. “Stiles is bleeding and freezing, and you didn’t call his dad?” she asked, her voice volume was high.

“He made me promise not to” Scott said, tilting his head. “We can find him by scent.” Lydia closed her eyes shut, taking a deep breath in. “If he was sleepwalking, he couldn’t have gotten far, right?”

“You didn’t notice his Jeep is gone, did you?” Aiden asked, his hands still on Stella’s shoulder, squeezing for support.

“You promised you wouldn’t call his dad” Lydia reacted, pulling her phone up and continued as she was trying to find Sheriff’s number in her contact list. “I didn’t.”

Scott tried to stop her. “Wait, Lydia, hold on” he said. “I can get more help. I can call Derek, Allison…”

“Everyone except for the cops!” Stella yelled, interrupting him. The anxiety in her voice was just so loud and clear now as she kept looking at the alpha while Lydia was already trying to call the sheriff, so she let her deal with that. She crossed her arms in front of her chest, her brown eyes were locked on Scott. “Great idea, Scott.”

“You guys remember Stella and Lydia get these feelings when someone’s about to die, right?” Aiden reminded them with a lot calmer voice than they are which could be a good thing. They needed a little calm during a situation like that since everyone else was either freaking out or… Well, freaking out.

Scott gulped down, nodded softly knowing that. He sighed. “You don’t have to call his dad” he murmured, admitting the defeat. “It’s five minutes to the station.” Scott and Isaac made their way to the door, but Stella stopped Aiden who was ready to follow them downstairs. She put her hand on his chest, stopping him so that he wouldn’t move. Aiden looked at her with a confused expression but didn’t do anything as he listened to her.

Lydia stopped moving next to him, knowing what Stella had in mind and agreeing with her while Stella softly tried to swallow the lump in her throat and then parted her lips, taking a deep breath. “We’ll catch up” she told them, looking at Scott.

“What? Why?” he questioned as he took a step towards her.

“There’s something here” Lydia answered them instead of the young Argent.

Isaac softly chuckled in a sarcastic way. “Yeah, evidence of total insanity” he commented, his gaze moving around in the room.

“We can figure out what’s wrong with him after we find a way to keep him from freezing to death” Scott anxiously responded. Stiles was his best friend. He was his brother. He was the one who was always there for him and now he had to save him. He had to find him and he had to get him back.

Stella softly nodded, feeling the same way. “Go” she repeated, agreeing with him but also knowing she had to stay here to actually find something. “We’ll be right behind you.”

When Isaac and Scott left them all alone, Stella and Lydia looked at each other and then looked back at the red strings.

Sheriff’s hand formed up in a fist and hit the table softly, taking a deep breath in and giving it out. He was trying so hard to control his feelings, calm himself down. His son was missing, and he was the only thing that’s left for him in this world. His dad was crazy, locked up in retirement house and his wife was gone.

He couldn’t lose his son too.

“Come on” he murmured to himself, so many emotions in his voice. Then he breathed in, straightened up and looked at Isaac and Scott. He hit the table again and continued. “If his Jeep is gone, that’s where we start.” He turned to the deputy, sitting behind his desk. “Parrish, let’s get an APB out on the blue 1980 CJ-5 Jeep.” He looked at another deputy. “Cordova, I want a list of any kind of industrial basement or sub-level of any building that he could’ve gotten into while sleepwalking.” Without taking a breath, he continued and now he was talking to everyone. “It’s the coldest night of the year so far. So, if he’s out there barefoot in just a T-shirt, he could already be hypothermic.” He breathed in. “Let’s move fast. Let’s think fast.” He looked at Scott and Isaac. “The two of you, come with me.” They walked inside the Sheriff’s office, Sheriff closed the door behind them and then looked at the two werewolves. “Okay. Is there anything you need to tell me that I can’t tell anyone out there?” 

“Lydia and Stella knew he was missing” Scott responded, remembering Sheriff knew those two girls were banshees.

“Can they help find him?” he asked, frowning.

“Well, they’re working on it” Isaac answered the Sheriff.

“Anything else?”

“I called Derek and Allison for help” Scott continued.

“Okay” Sheriff Stilinski murmured, looking at Scott. “Can you find him by scent?”

That’s when there was a knock on the door and Parrish opened it without waiting for an answer, peeking his head out between the ajar door, interrupting them. “We got it, sir” the deputy informed them quickly. “We found the Jeep.”

“It’s dead” Sheriff announced after opening the jeep’s door and checking if it was working. The Jeep was stopped in front of the hospital’s emergency entry. The accumulator of the car was definitely dried out. “He must have left the lights on.”

“Why would he come here?” Scott questioned, frowning his brows.

Sheriff let out a breath, looked at the hospital building. “Let’s find out.”

Derek was standing at the rooftop of the hospital, looking around, confused as he was trying to find out what the hell happened here and where was Stiles. When they first entered the hospital, Sheriff quickly went downstairs to the basement after what Stiles told Scott over the phone, while Derek followed the scent upstairs, here, to the roof.

“He’s not here” Derek announced loudly when he heard running footsteps of Isaac and Scott behind him. He continued without even looking at them. “Not anymore.”

“You mean the whole building?” Scott asked, slowing down.

“Gone” Derek answered, confirming.

“I’ll go tell Stilinski” Isaac said but right when he was about to make his way towards the exit and stepped into the staircase, he stopped when he heard Scott calling his name out.

“And see if you can find Allison” he told him, looking at Isaac with worry in his brown eyes. He continued. “She’s not answering her phone.” Isaac nodded, left them alone in the roof making his way to the stairs.

Meanwhile Scott walked towards Derek. “Notice how strong the scent is up here?” Derek asked, not looking at Scott but the roof from the edge they were standing on. His arms were crossed in front of his chest, frowning like he would usually do. “Ever hear of chemo signals?” He looked at Scott from the corner of his eyes. Understanding the answer from his emptiness on the expression, he looked back at the roof and continued. “Chemical signals that communicate emotion. And just our sweat can give off anger, fear, or disgust. Take a deep breath and tell me what you feel.”

Scott did what Derek told him to do and took a deep breath in and then he frowned with the thing that he felt. “Stress” he responded.

“And anxiety” Derek confirmed him.

“What was he doing up here?” Scott asked curiously, looking at Derek.

“I don’t know but there was definitely some kind of struggle” Derek answered the young wolf.

“With who?” he asked back with worry and curiousness.

Derek sighed. “Himself.”

Lydia and Stella were looking at the red strings, looking around while Aiden was grabbing the things that were on Stiles’ desk, checking them out. First, he picked up a picture of Scott and Stiles wearing their lacrosse uniforms, sitting on a bench and smiling at the camera. He scoffed as he put it back on the desk and grabbed another one. As he looked at it, he couldn’t help the smile on his face and turned towards Stella to show it to her. “Is that you?” he asked as Stella turned around to look at Aiden and then at the picture between his fingers. In the picture, Stiles who couldn’t be older than 6 or 7, was smiling to the photographer with his eyes almost gone. It was a cute picture until Stella saw the girl behind him that Aiden was pointing at, also around the age of 6-7. The little girl was brunette, had brown eyes and was photographed while rolling her eyes.

Stella found herself smiling first and then reached for the picture, examining it, looking really deeply at it. She was almost sure the little girl was her, but she couldn’t remember meeting Stiles before last year, in front of Allison’s house. That was the first memory of him in her mind. Him calling her The Other Argent… And that was it.

She scoffed with a frown, looking down at the picture. “I don’t know” she found herself murmuring, causing to Aiden frown and Lydia to turn her head to look at her in confusion. Meanwhile, Stella shrugged and gave the picture back to Aiden and looked back at the red strings.

“What do you mean you don’t know?” Lydia curiously questioned, causing Stella to look back at her once again as she was shocked as much as Aiden was. They both frowned as they were looking at the young Argent.

Stella crossed her arms in front of her chest and shrugged one more time. “I just…” she sighed and then continued. “I don’t remember” she responded. “About a month ago, when we were trying to find the Nemeton… I realized I don’t remember anything about the time that I have lived here, for about 7 years. Just little stuff, some people. Enough to know that I was actually born here but no memories. It’s almost like I’ve never lived here or even didn’t have a life till I was 7 because I just felt déjà vu.”

Aiden put the picture down and no one asked anything about it because Stella’s body language was telling them that this conversation was over so everyone went back to what they were doing before.

And then Aiden grabbed another frame, showed it to Lydia this time. It was one of her drawings of the magical tree Nemeton. “Didn’t you draw this?” he questioned curiously, smirking meaningfully. Stella smiled softly, knowing Lydia and Aiden were friends but she also knew Lydia was having the same problems as Stella. Looking at Aiden and seeing Boyd’s death was turning into a nightmare for them and lately feeling that a little less was hard on Stella and she was almost over what she told him back in Bio class, but Lydia was still behind those words. She still didn’t forgive him.

She just couldn’t.

Lydia looked at the young man. “Put that back” she fought back, making Aiden’s grin a little deeper and little bit more teasing.

“It’s yours, right?”

“It’s one of them” Lydia said as Stella’s brown eyes were moving around the room hopelessly and she sighed. She looked at Lydia and Aiden who was messing with her. “I guess.”

“He likes you a lot, doesn’t he?” Aiden kept messing with her.

Stella softly laughed. “You have to be stupid to not be able to see that” she murmured and then turned to Lydia and continued. “I mean… no offence.”

Lydia heard that but decided not to comment about it other than rolling her eyes and continued. “Maybe he likes the drawing a lot” she said, walking to Aiden who flipped the frame over and showed what was written behind it. _For Lydia…_

Stella chuckled, grabbing the frame from Aiden, but it didn’t stay with Stella for long because when she was about so say something, Lydia snatched it away her and put it back on the desk, parting her lips. “Okay” she murmured with the desperation of changing the subject. And then Lydia’s phone beeped with a new message, being her savior. She opened the text. “Nothing at the hospital. Derek headed to high school. Isaac going to find Allison” she read and then looked at Stella and Aiden. “And Scott’s with the sheriff.”

“And we’re standing in a bedroom staring at the walls” Aiden mocked themselves. Stella tightened her lips into a straight line and walked to the other corner of the room. Lydia slid her phone back to her bag. Aiden was moving his fingers on the strings and when he pulled it back to himself, Stella stopped hearing whispers and looked at Aiden quickly.

“What did you just do?” Lydia asked, hearing the same sounds as Stella. “Did you touch one of the strings?”

Aiden was looking at the young girl, confused as heck but he nodded his head anyway, confirming her. Stella frowned, leaning in against the string near her and pulled the string slowly, causing the voices to rise up in her and Lydia’s head once again. She gasped with fear and looked at Lydia who has done the same thing at the same time with Stella. She straightened up but still focused on the red strings. “What did that sound like to you?” Stella asked, murmuring. Her lips stayed apart with fear.

“Like a string being pulled” Aiden answered, frowned.

Stella furiously and heatedly turned to Aiden. “You didn’t hear people whispering?”

Aiden shook his head. “I definitely did not hear people whispering” he answered the young girl.

Hearing that, Lydia leaned her hear to the string and pulled the string once again. Both of the girls closed their eyes hearing the loud whispering. “You didn’t hear that?” Lydia asked with fear while Aiden was just looking at the two girls in front of him.

“Lydia, I’m not sure anyone hears what you girls hear” he answered them this time. His eyes were full of worry and mostly looking at Stella.

“They’re whispering” Stella said, to hear more and better, she leaned into a string. “Something about a house.”

“What house?” Aiden asked, still worried. Lydia pulled the string once again and the loud whispering filled up the girls’ ears. Lydia straightened up and looked at the red string and followed it to the source, seeing it was tied to a picture. A picture of a house.

They walked to the wall that had the picture on it. “That one” Lydia said, pointing the picture that was pinned on the board.

“What’s Eichen House?” Aiden asked.

“A mental health center” Stella answered the young man, looking at him but then she turned to look at Lydia and continued. “It’s where William Barrow, the shrapnel bomber, was committed, right?”

As Lydia softly nodded, confirming her, they heard Aiden’s voice. “Is that it?” he asked curiously, thinking they found where Stiles was.

“That’s where he is” Lydia claimed, looking at the picture again. “That’s where Stiles is.” Aiden quickly nodded and followed Lydia who was headed for the door but when he saw Stella still standing in the middle of the room, he stopped and looked at the young girl whose fingers were still on the red strings moving.

Stella stopped, feeling their gazes on her. “You go” she murmured, looking at them but her fingers staying on the strings as she gulped. “I, uh…”

“Stella, what the hell are you talking about?” Aiden questioned quickly, curiously, not being able to help himself but interrupting her. They knew where Stiles was and he had no idea why she wasn’t moving, why she wanted to stay here. “We know where he is, we have to go!”

“Aiden” Stella called out firmly in determination. “Tell the others what we’ve found with Lydia and go to Eichen house.” She softly shook her head; brown eyes were flickering with anxiety as she was looking at them which was the main reason why Aiden back down. “Look, I can’t… I can’t explain but I have to do something.”

“Okay, then” Aiden said, stepping back. “I am not leaving you here alone.” Stella took a deep breath, gave it out knowing nothing was going to change his mind, so she pressed her lips together and nodded with confirmation.

Lydia breathed in. “I’ll let you guys know” she told them and then walked out of the room, leaving them alone.

When it was just the two of them inside Stiles’ room, without losing any time, Stella looked at Aiden. There was something about her. She was scared but also determined. “Now… Whatever happens, do not interfere, alright?” she started explaining. She took a deep breath as she was thinking about the thing she was about to do. This was definitely a dangerous plan, definitely a long shot. Last time she did that, she opened a door to her mind, even though it was a different situation but still, she couldn’t close that door up until few days ago with a spooky dream. She was still shivering even thinking about the voice and the guy who talked to her in the dream, but she couldn’t ignore what she was feeling. Something was definitely off. And she had to try.

“Wait, wha-?” Aiden couldn’t even finish his sentence.

“I’m going to try something” Stella said, interrupting him. “I don’t think Stiles is actually at the Eichen House.” In case she was wrong and it was just her going crazy, the others had to go there and check it out. “Something is different… Something is not right. Maybe… Maybe I can do it.”

“You can do what?” Aiden curiously asked, insisting.

“I can get into Stiles’ brain” Stella answered. “This is a psychic ability that Deaton and I discovered I could do months ago. We didn’t have time to work on it but… I am hoping it would work now. But still, I’m not sure. I just…” She took a deep breath, licked her lips to give them wetness. “It’s something I have to try.”

Aiden wasn’t happy about it. He was definitely worried about her, but he didn’t have any chance but nod his head, admitting the defeat and watching Stella who softly smiled at him with gratitude and then looked at the red strings once again. She took a deep breath as she held one of them and closed her eyes. She tried to concentrate, focus on the red string under her fingers and then she tried to focus on Stiles, her best friend who meant so much to her.

When she opened her eyes back on few seconds later that felt like minutes, she couldn’t see where she was at first. It was dark and rusty but then she realized it was a basement.

Agent McCall shook the paper in his hands, showing it to Parrish with his brows raised up on his face curiously, wanting to do something to help them find Stiles. “Hey, is this the exact transcript of Scott and Stiles’ phone call?” he asked, standing in front of the deputy. His arm was in a cast due to the attack of the onis only few days ago.

“It’s what he gave us” Parrish answered, looking up at the agent.

“But these words?” Rafael looked down at the paper. “Stiles says, _‘something smells terrible. My eyes are watering.’_ ”

Before Parrish could answer him, they heard Melissa’s voice causing them to look at the direction where the voice came from. “Hi, I’m Melissa McCall” she said, introducing herself to the person sitting behind the front desk. “I was hoping to see Agent McCall.”

Rafael walked up to her, not letting the deputy on the front desk say anything. “What are you doing here?” he asked, looking at his ex-wife.

“My shift was over” Melissa explained. “I just wanted to see if I could help.”

Stella’s breathing was normal, her heart wasn’t beating so fast but as she felt the fear rising inside her, she knew it was a temporary situation. There was nothing weird she could see yet but there was nothing she could see at all but knowing that she was in Stiles’ subconsciousness, anything could happen any time.

The basement she was in was dark, pitch black. She couldn’t see anything, so she was trying to find something she could touch and help her stand. She sighed when her hand meet with the cold metal wall. She stood up, trying to find her balance in the dark.

And then she heard the chalk meeting the wall, causing a high-pitched voice that Stella hated and couldn’t stand. It caused her to shiver, not enjoying it. She startled, jumped on her spot and then she took a deep breath and started walking down the hall, towards the voice. Her hand was on the wall, leading her since she couldn’t see a damn thing.

“You don’t understand, do you?” Stella froze when she heard _that_ voice that was so familiar. Her breathings got heavier; her heartbeat got faster. That was the voice from the dream in the hospital. The voice that told her to let him in. In that moment Stella ignored the dark room, how she couldn’t see anything and walked a lot faster towards the source of the voice. Somehow, she wasn’t making any noise, every time her shoes touched the ground, nothing was coming out and it was in her favor. For the moment… “It’s a riddle…” He paused. Stella could almost feel the grin on that horrifying face that she never saw. She had an image in her mind and it terrified her even more. “Do you have any riddles, Stiles?”

Stella started walking faster, hearing Stiles’ name but this place felt like a maze. No matter how much she walked, she just couldn’t find her way out. She was at the point where she was questioning whether she was moving at all or not.

“A few” Stiles said with a whisper, shaking due to the cold and the fear. Stella gulped down and, even though it was no use, she started walking faster. She had to find Stiles and get him out of this nightmare.

“What gets bigger the more you take away?” the scary voice asked.

“A hole” Stiles answered, scared.

“What gets wetter the more it dries?”

“A towel” Stiles responded as he sniffed.

“When is a door not a door?” the voice asked; Stella tried to walk faster, hearing the question as she was holding onto the walls so that she wouldn’t lose her way more.

“When it’s ajar” Stiles answered after a pause with his shaky voice.

“Everyone has it, but no one can lose it. What is it?” the voice asked. It was the same riddle. The same riddle that he asked Stella and now he was asking it to Stiles. Stella remembered what he said to her in the dream. He told her it was either gonna be her or someone really close to her, how he was gonna take his revenge of Stella not letting him in. Stella felt the burn in her throat, in her eyes. She tried to gulp down, tried to get rid of the lump but failed. This couldn’t be happening.

This couldn’t be him.

“I don’t… I don’t know” Stiles responded, afraid and cold.

“Everyone has it, but no one can lose it. What is it, Stiles?” Hearing the question again a little louder this time, Stella let go off the wall and started running, not knowing where she was going or even if she was going. She could feel the tears streaming down on her face. She heard Stiles, telling the voice that he doesn’t know. The voice asked the riddle once again. Stiles didn’t answer. The voice repeated the question, in Japanese this time.

“I don’t know!” Stiles screamed and this sound got followed by a groan and the chain pulling sound. “No! No! No! No! Wait! No, wait!” Stiles was yelling, screaming, begging the voice to stop and then it was too much for Stella.

She parted her lips to let out a banshee scream.

Stella opened her eyes in the woods, heavily breathing, tears falling down on her face and Aiden by her side, wrapping her with his muscular arms, hugging her from behind. His eyes were away, watching something in the distance. Stiles was begging Melissa to stop, his eyes were closed but as Melissa was holding Stiles, telling him to calm down, trying to calm him down, she looked at Stella far away from them, hearing her scream but quickly focused back on Stiles.

Stiles was never in any basement. All this time, he was inside the coyote den. That’s why his eyes were watering and the one who noticed that was Agent McCall, paying attention to the little details in the phone call transcript. Meanwhile Stella was inside Stiles’ brain where he was actually in the basement of Eichen House and Aiden followed her up here and stopped her, seeing Agent McCall and Melissa near the den, pulling Stiles out and trying to get him to wake up.

If he hadn’t stop her, then they would have to come up with an explanative story for this and he didn’t want that when he knew the girl between his arms were crying, afraid and confused. Her shoulders were moving up and down with each sob, even more when they could hear Stiles’ devastating begs from all the way up here. “Wait! Wait!” Stiles screamed more, covering Stella’s scream for Agent McCall. Meanwhile Melissa hugged tightly to Stiles, still trying to get him to calm down. “Wait! Wait!”

“Stiles! Stiles!” she said with nurturing and softness and affection in her voice. “Stiles, you’re alright.” Stiles stopped screaming, breathing heavily. Opened his teary hazel eyes to see where he was. At first, he couldn’t see that he was near the coyote den, sitting on the ground with Melissa’s arms wrapped around him. He didn’t know what to do as he felt terrified, scared while remembering where he thought he was at. “You’re alright, Stiles. It’s okay.” Stella wiped away her tears, not feeling strong enough to stand on her toes by herself. She leaned back against Aiden’s chest who was still holding her. She gulped down, seeing Stiles in that shape. “Stiles, you’re alright.”

Allison woke up with a banging on the door to their apartment. She quickly walked up to the door in his pajamas, not surprised when she didn’t saw Stella in her room from the corner of her eyes, knowing she was usually out but definitely shocked when she saw Isaac as she opened the door.

“What the hell have you been doing?” Isaac asked, the minute Allison opened the door for him.

“Sleeping” Allison answered. Last thing she remembered was that leaving Stella in the living room watching TV and Chris sleeping in his room. She was sleeping since 10 PM and woke up to Isaac knocking their door like crazy. “What the hell are you doing?”

Isaac frowned with her answer. “You didn’t get any calls or texts?” he asked, causing a confused expression on Allison’s face. She didn’t say anything but quickly turned around to go back to her room with Isaac behind her after closing the door.

Allison walked up to her nightstand and grabbed her phone. She frowned as she noticed something. “My phone’s off” she told him as she opened back her phone. She looked at Isaac and parted her lips to continue. “I never turn my phone off.” When the phone got on, it started to ping and chime to let them know there were several text messages and notifications and voicemails. Allison slowly raised her eyebrows as she was reading the texts quickly and then looked at Isaac over her shoulder. “Sleepwalking? Is he okay?”

“Yeah,” Isaac said, confirming her. “Stella called me on my way here told me that they found him a few minutes ago and they’re bringing him to the hospital.”

“I don’t know what happened” Allison said again, looking at her black phone. “I never turn it off.” And then she noticed a different kind of voicemail. With a frown, she played it. The guy was talking in Japanese and it definitely confused the hell out of them.

Isaac frowned, listening to the man. “Who’s that?”

“Let me take you home” Aiden suggested as they were walking to Aiden’s car. Stella’s car was in front of the Stilinski’s house and she had to get it. But Aiden had something different in mind. So did Stella. As she shook her head no, Aiden sighed and looked at her in the eye. “Stella, you need to get some rest.”

“No, what I need is to get my car from his house and then go to the hospital” she argued but Aiden shook his head no, refusing her demand. She wasn’t going to win this time. “Aiden, I-” Her follow-up argument was left incomplete as she startled, suddenly hearing a sharp sound that felt like two metals clanking to each other fast, like they were being banged towards each other. She looked around, like she could see the source but as always, it was gone as fast as it came to her ears.

“Stella, did you hear something?” Aiden asked curiously. Stella licked her lips, feeling the sound drifting away from her to the darkest and unreachable parts of her brain. So, she had nothing to do than shake her head no. Then her phone buzzed. Stella grabbed it to read the text from Scott that telling her that Stiles was doing okay, and he was sleeping. Reading the text, Aiden looked at Stella, brushing her hair back. Before he met Derek, he wanted to know she was safe and sound, sleeping in a comfortable bed. It’s been a long day for her. His hand cupped her cheek as he looked at her. “Let me take you home, alright?”

Stella looked in his brown eyes. She knew he was going to meet Derek but… “I don’t want to go home” she whispered softly. Aiden looked at her for a while. He was wondering what was going on in her mind. He wanted to help but this hallucination was somehow different and there was still so much that he didn’t know about Stella and so much that she didn’t tell him about.

Aiden slightly nodded with a smile. “Okay, okay” he softly whispered, his thumb moving softly on her cheek. “Let me take you to my place then. Ethan is there so you won’t be alone. Argue a little, feel a little alive.” Stella let out a chuckle out of intention. “After I’m done with Derek, I’ll come back. Okay?”

Stella tightened her lips. Her heart was pounding out of her chest and then she slightly nodded. Aiden wrapped his arms around her in a protective way, pulled her into a soft hug and then as he guided her to the car, he let out a soft yet worried breath out from his nose.

Aiden was still thinking about Stella while driving to the hospital lot to meet with Derek who was fixing up Stiles’ blue jeep. He left Stella back in his house, on his bed. She was almost falling asleep when he had to leave. He was worried but he had to push all of it behind as he climbed out of his black car.

There was something important he had to talk with Derek after all.

“So, you think he was just sleepwalking, or is there something more to it?” Aiden asked, crossing his arms in front of his chest. Meanwhile Derek had some tools to charge the battery on the car, trying to get it to work again.

“In this town, there’s always something more” Derek answered without even looking Aiden, not putting much thought to it. Of course, he was worried, but a sleepwalking didn’t really mean a lot to him yet.

Aiden dropped his shoulders to his sides. “What if I told you I know something more?” Derek straightened up, looked at Aiden and opened his heads to sides as he was asking what. “I kind of overheard…” he started and then softly smiled. “Well, I listened in on Stiles talking to Scott and Stella.” Hearing her name, Derek thought about the thing his mother told him, but he had to push it back into back of his brain and focus on Aiden. This wasn’t something he should’ve been thinking right about now. “How he thinks he was the one who wrote that message in the Chemistry room.” This got Derek’s attention. Aiden continued. “The message telling Barrow to kill Kira.”

“You think Stiles… skinny, defenseless Stiles is the Nogitsune?” Derek questioned with sarcasm and teasing in his voice, raising up his eyebrows causing Aiden to shrug. “A powerful, dark spirit?”

“I’m not the only one thinking it. I’m just the only one saying it” Aiden responded. He took a deep breath and continued. “Stella’s been acting really strange ever since the hospital and now today. She tells me every hallucination. What happened, what was weird… But she didn’t tell me what happened in Stiles’ brain, but I observed her the whole road from woods to my house. I didn’t need chemo signals to understand she was extremely nervous, on the edge.”

“So, you’re saying this thing wants to possess someone and chooses Stiles?” Derek asked, raised his eyebrows more. “Why wouldn’t it take someone bigger, stronger? Someone with… a little more power…” Derek thought about the conversation he had with his mother once again. Aiden was looking at Derek with a frown, trying to understand the sudden mood change. Meanwhile Derek was holding the cables that was going to give the power to the accumulator of the jeep but not moving them as he had a thought. “Like Stella” he murmured but Aiden heard him. Derek connected the cables, hearing the electrocution and then looked at Aiden. “Stella was there that night. She got hit by the ripped electrocuted cables while trying to save Kira. Barrow hit her, right?”

“Yeah, but she is not the Nogitsune” Aiden responded with a frown, thinking about what Derek said and what he meant. He was definitely confused. “She’s already marked.”

“Maybe” Derek nodded but then quickly continued. “But still… Stiles wasn’t Nogitsune’s first choice. It was Stella.” Hale tried to remember the myths about this creature. “He has to get a permission to control someone, they need to let him in and when Stella said no, he got pissed.”

“So what? He chose Stiles to punish her?” Aiden frustratedly asked, drawing his eyebrows together. 

Derek’s eyes were locked down on the cables he was holding, thinking about a lot of things at the same time. He didn’t speak for a while but then parted his lips. “That day, when they were trying to find the Nemeton, he also opened a door to his mind like Stella. He is human so… It’s a lot easier for him to possess Stiles” Derek explained. “Besides… Stella cares about him. She trusts him. He is the first person she trusted here after Allison.” Aiden knew that, he wasn’t happy about that, but he couldn’t deny the truth, so he kept it quiet. “It only makes sense that Nogitsune chose Stiles after her.”

“So, what’s the plan then?” he asked anxiously.

All Derek did was look up at Aiden, still holding the electrocuted cables. 

The other day, Kira saw Scott in the hallway at the school. She sighed as she shouted after him, but he didn’t answer her. He just ignored her and walked away. Young girl kept watching him walk away from her and then she turned around, hearing someone else from behind. “He’s a little preoccupied…” Derek stopped looking at Scott and his eyes found Kira who was looking back at him confusedly. “But I can help you.”

Kira frowned. “Why would you want to help me?” she asked curiously.

“Because I’m going to need you to tell me everything you know about foxfire and I want you to tell me everything that happened at the power station with William Barrow” Derek answered, looking at her. Kira looked at the hallway Scott walked away from for a split second and when her eyes found Derek once again, the werewolf continued. “Actually, I want you to show me.”

The other day, Stella went back to the hospital instead of school which was her plan all along ever since Aiden convinced her to drive her to their house. To be honest, she planned to go to hospital after Aiden dropped her off, but he didn’t leave her side until she was practically fallen asleep and Stella was just too tired to wake up and leave at that point.

And now, she was sitting on the same couch that she did few days back when she took Stiles to hospital during school hours. Stiles was sleeping on the same hospital bed with a little help from the sedative Melissa injected into his body. Meanwhile Stella’s eyes were closed, and her fingers were squeezing the bone on her nose, thinking about the dream she saw and the things she saw in Stiles’ mind. Things that she didn’t tell anyone about.

She took a very deep and sharp breath, let the air fill in her lungs and gave it out as Melissa’s anxious voice reached to her. She didn’t move a muscle, but she started to listen in on her and the Sheriff. “It was the other day. I asked him some questions. Just about symptoms. And, um…” Melissa said, obviously worried about Stiles. But there was something else… fear in her voice. It was almost like she wanted to say something else but couldn’t bring herself to do it.

Sheriff nodded sadly, knowing what was actually in her mind. “Yeah, it’s okay” he responded, tired, exhausted from the roller-coaster of emotions that he had to go through and about to go through. “I think I, uh… I think I know what you’re talking about. I’ve been writing these down for the past two weeks.” He handed something over to Melissa which looked like a small notebook from where Stella was sitting. She took a deep breath and wondered how much a breath contain so much anxiety and worry in it. “I think we need to do some tests.”

Allison and Isaac were standing in front of Mr. Yukimura’s desk as he was listening to the Japanese voicemail that was left for Allison the other day, waiting for him to translate. “You’re right, it’s Japanese” he confirmed them, lifted his head up to look at them. “Who left this on your phone?”

“I don’t know” Allison responded, shaking her head. “All of the messages are the same and they all say Blocked ID.”

“Can you translate it?” Isaac asked, frowning and looking at their History teacher.

“Mostly” he said and continued. “The man speaking is giving instructions actually. The first line is _‘All evacuees are required to stay at least 10 feet back from outside fences.’_ ”

Allison and Isaac frowned confusedly, looking at each other. None of them understood a damn thing. “What does that mean?” Isaac asked, looking back at Mr. Yukimura. “What fences?”

“The fences surrounding a Japanese internment camp during World War II.” Allison and Isaac shared another look while their history teacher continued his explanation. “After Pearl Harbor, Japanese-Americans were rounded up and put in camps.” He pointed the phone on the desk between them. “This man is reading instructions to prisoners upon their arrival.”

Allison grabbed her phone and took it out from the speaker and slid it back to her pocket as she parted her lips. “Well, where does something like this come from?” she asked, looking at Mr. Yukimura.

“I have no idea” Mr. Yukimura answered. “Because it’s fake.” Allison and Isaac raised up their eyebrows at the same time, looking at the teacher across them, surprised. “It mentions the name of the internment camp as _‘Oak Creek’_ but there was no internment camp named Oak Creek in California.”

After a while later, Stella left the room to get herself some food from the wending machine and called Scott to let him know what was happening since he was in school and he knew that she was gonna be there the whole day. After ending her call with Scott and getting herself a granola bar, she went outside the building and sat on an empty bench.

Then the voices started. It was the same sound that she heard last night in the woods. She was sitting near the parking lot and every time she heard someone close their doors to their cars or even if they opened it… that sound thudded in her ear, making her startle. She closed her eyes shut with the raising volume of the sound, but it was such a loud sound that, every time she heard it, she couldn’t help but jump on her spot as she startled with fear in her eyes, begging it to stop.

“I’m not sure I know how to pronounce this.” Stella was standing nervously near Scott whose eyes were moving up and down between Stiles and her, obviously worried about them both. He asked her if she was okay, but all got was a nod but then the doctor started speaking and they focused on him who turned to the sheriff with a white paper between his hands. “Or if it’s not actually a misspelling.”

That’s when Scott put his arms around Stella’s shoulder for support, pulling her into a half hug which Stella was definitely grateful for. She sighed as she heard Sheriff’s voice responding to the doctor. “Just call him Stiles” he said. His voice came out a lot harsher than normal probably because of the stress that was caused by what was happening at the moment.

Doctor nodded and closed the file between his hands, turned to look at Stiles who looked at him back. “Okay, Stiles, just to warn you” he started, walking towards Stiles and stopped right in front of Stella and Scott. “You’re going to hear a lot of noise during the MRI. It’s due to pulses of electricity going through metal coils inside the machine.” Stiles’ hand was moving up and down on his arm nervously meanwhile because of the same feeling, Stella and Scott were playing with their fingers. The doctor continued. “Uh, if you want, we can get you earplugs or headphones.”

“Oh, no, no. I don’t need anything” Stiles rejected the suggestion.

“Hey, we’re just on the other side of that window” Sheriff said, getting his son’s gaze and attention on him as he was trying to give him something that he can rely on and just be relax during MRI. “Okay?”

“Okay” Stiles said softly. Sheriff smiled and tapped on his son’s shoulder slightly and with Melissa and the doctor, got out of the white room and all three went behind the glass. When they were left alone, Stiles started speaking again but he was looking down at his fingers. “You guys know what they’re looking for, right?” There was a moment of silence between the three of them. Silence of desperation because as Stella lifted her head up to look at Stiles and Scott kept looking down at his fingers, all of them knew what the doctors were looking for. “It’s called frontotemporal dementia.” Scott finally looked up at Stiles with sadness and worry in his eyes, feeling helpless. “Areas of your brain start to shrink. It’s what my mother had. It’s the only form of dementia that can hit teenagers. And there’s no cure.” The expression on Scott’s face caused Stella to try to gulp down to get rid of the lump in her throat. She had tears in her eyes, her lips were in a straight line, pressed against each other. She pretty much had the same expression as Scott. 

Scott wiped away one drop of tear quickly and took a step forward towards his best friend, parting his lips. “Stiles, if you have it, we’ll do something.” A silence occurred in the room, but Scott quickly cut it with determination. “I’ll do something.” Stiles lifted his head up, looked at Scott and he knew what he meant. As they hugged each other so tightly like they didn’t want to let go off each other, Stella stood behind them and just looked at them. Meanwhile in the other side of the glass, Sheriff and Melissa were watching their boys hugging each other. They let out a sigh that didn’t relieve them at all. They felt the struggle, they felt the sadness and the grief and the desperation.

Scott pulled away and made his way out of the room but had to stop when he realized Stella wasn’t following him. He looked at her, asking if she was coming with his eyes but all Stella did was take a deep breath and looked at Scott. “I’ll be there in a minute” she murmured. Scott nodded, understanding, and stepped outside, walked to the room behind the class leaving Stella and Stiles alone. Stiles was looking at her, confused and worried but knew better than that to not ask what was happening because he knew Stella was just getting ready to talk.

She quickly wiped away her tears like nothing happened and parted her lips. “When I first met you… you were just another human that annoyed me and all I wanted to do was just squeeze your throat.” The first sentence that left Stella’s lips made Stiles raise his eyebrows with confusion and look at her, a little bit offended. But even after all that, he knew what it was all about so there was also a soft smile on his face and a little bit sadness in there as well. “You’ve been calling me _‘The other Argent’_ ever since we’ve met but that wasn’t what annoyed the hell out of me. The fact that you calling me that didn’t annoy me like usual and that annoyed the hell out of me. I have no idea why it triggered me less and I didn’t know for a very long time.” Stiles was keeping his silence, looking right at Stella’s face. “Why didn’t you tell me? That we met before all that?”

“You…” The shock in his hazel eyes were too obvious.

Stella dropped her gaze. “I don’t remember it” she responded to his unfinished question. She looked at him. “I saw the picture in your room and I felt like it triggered a memory in my mind but I just… I know. I’m not going to tell you how or why. I wish I could remember it but for some reason I can’t.” Stella took a deep breath and thought about the picture Aiden found in Stiles’ room. “I’m not going to let anything happen to you Stilinski. Anything.” Stiles exhaled and then, without saying anything, he pulled her into a hug. Stella hugged him back and closed her eyes, resting her chin on his shoulder with her arms behind him. “I’m sorry for giving you such a hard time.”

Stiles softly chuckled. “Yeah, I’m sorry too” he murmured, making Stella let out soft but sad scoff as a response.

“I don’t know if I should go in” Kira told Derek as she stood still right next to the black car and made him stop and look at her back. Derek made his way to Kira, shaking his head as he was asking why. Kira parted her lips to answer his silent question. “You’re going to tell Scott that Barrow might have used foxfire created by me to jump start the Nogitsune’s power inside Stiles and Stella. Even though Stella is not the Nogitsune, Stiles might be.”

“Yeah” Derek confirmed, not getting Kira’s point.

“So, basically that I helped a dark spirit take control of his two best friends” she summarized.

Derek paused for a while, did the simple math, and looked at Kira. “You should probably wait here.”

Stella was walking down the hallways when the sound started again. She left the room and tried to get out of the hospital but hearing metal clanking very loudly inside her brain was making concentration really hard. All she wanted was to just collapse onto the floor, close her eyes and… Scream.

But she held herself when she heard the familiar voice which was coming from Derek who was looking at her with a worried frown. “Stella, hey, hey, hey… Take it easy.” He grabbed her by the arm when she was about to fall, preventing her from collapsing on her face. “You okay?” he asked.

Stella got her balance back, opened her eyes and looked at Derek. “Derek?” she questioned. It was a simple word. It was just his name but she was actually asking what he was doing here but not intended to get her answer because she just needed to get out of here. The metal clanking sound was getting louder in her brain and she needed to get to her car and drive somewhere far away from this hospital. She had to find a way to stop this sound which made her want to claw her brains out. “I’m fine” she managed to say after a while. “I have to go. I’ll see you later.”

She freed herself from Derek and without giving him a chance to say anything, she walked away from him ignoring him calling behind her. She got inside her car and, violating the speed limit, she drove away.

“You know the stuff you were telling me about chemo signals earlier?” Scott broke the silence after Derek telling him about what happened with Stella when he first got here and the thing about the fox fire. Scott had lots of things to think about, lots of things to deal with but now that Derek and he were sitting across from each other on hospital chairs and waiting for his friend to come out from MRI, he felt like he needed a breather. “It reminded me of the time you were teaching me to use anger to control the shift.”

Derek lightly chuckled. “I think you ended up teaching me more about that” he softly reacted, looking at Scott as his elbows were on his legs and he was leaning forward.

Scott laughed, softly nodded, looked at him. “Are you teaching me again?”

“Think of it more like sharing a few trade secrets” Derek said as an answer to Scott’s question and then he quickly continued. “You know I took Cora back to South America, right? It’s where she spent most of her time after the fire. But that’s not the only reason I left.” Derek rubbed his hands together and looked at Scott. “I needed to talk to my mother.”

“Your dead mother?” Scott questioned in disbelief, raising his eyebrows as he was looking at Derek, confused.

“She told me somethings that changed my perspective on a lot of things” he said but kept the actual thing to himself for a while. It was a truth that he couldn’t sink it yet, let alone tell it to someone. He decided to keep it as a secret for a while. First, he had to deal with it himself. “She said that my family didn’t just live in Beacon Hills. They protected it. This town needs someone to protect it. Someone like you…”

“And someone like you to teach me a few trade secrets” Scott added, making Derek softly smile and shake his head but then something occurred to Scott that broke the smile and quickly stood up with realization. “He was trying to protect us. Stiles… Stiles was protecting us. Both of them were…” Scott thought about what Derek told him. How Nogitsune first jumped to Stella and then to Stiles. Scott looked at Derek in a hurry. “Stella told me that lately she’s been having trouble of sleeping. But she said it’s not like before. She was trying to keep herself awake not to…” He licked her lips quickly and continued while Derek stood up as well. “She was trying to stall the Nogitsune to protect us because… Because Stella isn’t just a human, she is also a banshee. But then he chose Stiles.” Scott gave out the deep breath that he took. “They were both trying to protect us.”

Derek sharply exhaled. “From themselves.”

“What are we looking for?” Derek asked as they arrived at the rooftop, looking around.

“I’m not sure” Scott answered. “But I think Stiles wasn’t just up here struggling with himself. I think he was struggling not to do something.” Scott and Derek stopped in front of the fences; Scott pulled his hand up to see something. He tried to touch to see if there was something there, and then a bag fell down from the top of the fences. He pulled the bag to himself, looking at the tools inside it. They had no idea what Stiles was planned to do with all these but as they noticed the ripped off cable that was electrocuted, they kind of had few ideas. 

None of them being good…

Stella parked her car in a dark alley between a drugstore and a restaurant, and she was able to do that barely without losing control due to the loud sound banging up inside her mind. She closed her eyes, tears forming up in them. One drop slowly fell down to her cheek and then to her chin. Her hand reached out for the radio as she first turned the volume up of the music to the highest but when it didn’t help, she just turned it off completely. The sounds of metal clanking kept ringing in her ears, driving her nuts. It was getting louder and louder by the second and didn’t look like it was gonna stop.

The thing she didn’t know was that Stiles was hearing the exact sound in the MRI and Lydia was also hearing the same thing inside her brain, laying down on her back in her room, begging God and gods to stop this torture.

Stella tightened every muscle on her body when the sound reached the highest volume and highest pitch. Her hands hit the steering wheel, held it tight and then parted her lips. As the screams of the banshees rose through Beacon Hills, Stella closed her eyes and she could swear, for a second there, she saw the actual face of the Nogitsune grinning at her.

When Stiles opened his eyes back, he saw that the MRI room was dark and he was standing near the machine with his own clothes on. Which was concerning because he could remember that the last time he was inside the machine, doctor was telling his father the bad news even though he couldn’t hear them, and he was wearing a hospital gown.

But then he heard the voice again. “Have you figured out my riddle yet?” it asked. “If you answer correctly, we might consider letting them go.”

“Letting who go?” Stiles asked, his voice came out shaky.

Nogitsune looked behind the class, looking at Stiles’ father and Melissa but it looked like there was some kind of veil. “Your friends. Your family. Everyone who ever meant something to you.” That scary voice was terrifying. Stiles’ lips started to shake; the feeling of anxiety and fear started to rise up inside him. “We’re going to destroy all of them, Stiles.” Stiles dropped a single tear from his eyes. “One-by-one.”

Stiles started to cry but it wasn’t a sob or anything. It was a silent. It was like he already knew what was about to happen to him but trying to postpone it. “Why?” he asked shakily, his breathings got heavier.

“Everyone has it, but no one can lose it. What is it?” Nogitsune asked, looked at Stiles.

Stiles shook his head. “I don’t know.”

“Everyone has it, but no one can lose it. What is it?”

“I don’t know” Stiles repeated.

“Everyone has it…!” The voice got louder, the scarier. As he started to ask the question again, he was unwrapping the mummy wrapping out of his face. Stiles took a step back, terrified. “But no one can lose it. WHAT IS IT?!” Stiles closed his ears with pressing his hands to them, trying to block him away but it wasn’t possible. “What is it!?” he asked one more time, trying to get himself out of the bandages all over his body and face.

“I don’t know!” Stiles screamed, hurting his throat but then paused. He realized he knew the answer. His hands, his shoulders dropped. He softly gasped.

“What is it Stiles?” the voice asked, this time the voice wasn’t that scary. It was normal.

“A shadow” Stiles murmured. He turned around, saw the Nogitsune who took out the last bits of bandages around him, revealing the man in it. His shadow… A smirk, a mocking grin formed up in his face. Stiles closed his eyes and when he opened them back, he wasn’t himself anymore.

He was the Nogitsune.

When the cable got ripped off, Derek and Scott were still on the roof as they were trying to figure out what was happening and what was Stiles’ plan. But with the electricity crackling, lightnings flying around, they pulled themselves back, taking cover but it was obvious that they were freaked and surprised about what was happening.

The cable burned down and with all the power from the electricity, it was flying around in the air and without even Derek and Scott were able to do something, it flew in front of the hospital where the civilians were standing, trying to understand what was happening.

“You know me” Noshiko, Kira’s mom, stated when she saw the Nogitsune walking towards her. The lights were flickering and taking it as his advantage, Stiles flew from the MRI room and thought about getting the hell out of here really quick but for the moment that plan was on hold. First, he had someone from his past that he had to talk with. “Then you remember that I won’t be deterred by your choice of host. Even if it’s an innocent boy.”

Nogitsune smirked. “I’d rather Stella Argent as my host, but what can you do, right?” he said with his rusty sarcastic voice.

“Even if it’s an innocent boy or a girl” Noshiko corrected her sentence. “It doesn’t mean anything to me.” She shook her head. “Not this time.”

“Are you threatening us?” Nogitsune asked. It was like he didn’t take anything serious, like he was enjoying it. Then two onis appeared behind her but that didn’t affect Nogitsune either. He playfully raised his eyebrows, his lips formed up a teasing ’o’ and took a breath from his ‘o’ shaped lips like he faked he was impressed by it.

“Now I’m threatening you” Noshiko said, pretty confidently.

“We’re not really afraid of your little fireflies” he said, shaking his head. He turned around, started walking.

“If the oni can’t defeat you, then I know someone who will” Noshiko yelled after the Nogitsune. Stiles stopped, looked over his shoulder and it was obvious that he was thinking but the smirk on his face was telling something else.

Even though Kira was able to save herself from the first attack of the electrocuted cable, it went back to her like a boomerang, like it had its own will and own brain. It was like it was a living thing and acting on its own.

And then there was the ambulance that driving right at Kira. Young girl jumped left but then whatever it was going to happen to Kira happened to the ambulance. The ripped of cable blocked the driver’s view, the man lost his control and hit something, knocked over. Nothing happened to the driver but the water pipes that he broke caused the roads to stay underwater and when there was water and electricity, it was never a good sign.

Especially when the supernatural was involved.

“Oh God” Kira murmured in fear. Her eyes moved up between the cable and the water. Allison as another one who saw it, stopped her car immediately meanwhile the water puddle reached to the ambulance. The driver, not noticing that, got off the ambulance and the minute his feet touched the water, he got electrocuted and fell down on the road. “Get back!” Kira screamed. “Everyone, get back!” She was shaking her hands above her head, trying to get people to listen her. “Everyone, get back!”

Allison tried to help the driver, but Isaac pushed her to the grass, seeing the way that puddle created for itself. “Allison!” he screamed the minute his feet touched the water. He gasped with the electricity, fell down.

“Isaac!” Allison screamed.

Meanwhile another person stepped inside the puddle without any intention. Seeing that woman got hurt, Kira climbed onto the top of a car. Turned around, looked at her surroundings at the people. She tried to think about what she could do and then jumped right inside the puddle.

Nothing happened. She looked at her hands, her feet. She was fine. Scott and Derek were looking at her, at the edge of the water barely stopping themselves after running down after the cable.

And they were as surprised as Kira was.

But what surprised them even more was that Kira quickly grabbed the flying cable, she held the ripped off part and stopped the electrocution with electricity crackling. She closed her eyes. She knew this much of currency should have been turned her into a barbeque, but she was fine. And it looked like whatever she was doing was working.

When Kira opened her eyes back, Scott saw her eyes which were glowing with an orange-ish color. Kira dropped the cable and the water became a safe place again. Knowing that, Derek rant to Isaac who was on the ground, smelling like a burned meat. “Isaac?” he asked but he heard nothing back. He checked his pulse. Gasped. “He’s not breathing.” He quickly turned to Scott. “Scott, he’s not breathing!”


	19. LETHARIA VULPINA

_**** Noshiko walked up to her daughter with fast steps and grabbed her by the arm, looking right in her eyes. Kira startled as she parted her lips to speak in a hurry, watching people roll Isaac’s hospital bed to the surgery room. “I saw what you did” she said causing Kira to look back at her mother. “But now’s not the time for anybody else to see.”_

_But Scott heard them. ****_

_**** “Two people said they saw Stiles’ jeep leave the hospital” Parrish informed him as he was walking towards to the sheriff who was on alert since his son was missing._

_His blue eyes found the deputy. “Someone needs to find him” he responded firmly and determined. “Now.” ****_

_**** Rafael frowned, looking at the cable between his hands, kneeling down on the ground. He looked over his shoulder to show it to the other deputies. “Is it me or was this cut?” he asked but he already knew the answer. He slowly gave his breath out. “Tell the others to keep an eye out for signs of sabotage.” ****_

_**** “Scott? What the hell happened here?” Stella asked as she climbed out of her car noticed the water puddle on the ground and cut cable and all the messes that were happening around her. And seeing the cops, hearing the sirens and the expression on Scott’s face were not comforting elements at all. Besides, Scott was just standing near his bike, not answering Stella while he was the one who called her here in the first place was also something that showed Stella, whatever the hell was happening was definitely not good. All of these were red screaming flags and Stella needed an answer immediately. “Scott, where is Stiles?” She paused, remembered Isaac’s text and then Scott’s. “Where’s Isaac, Scott?!” ****_

As Scott was laying on his bed on his stomach, the memories of last night after the incident flew into his mind. As he was thinking about the thing that he heard Noshiko say to Kira as they carried Isaac to his room in the hospital, straightened up. He sat on the edge of his bed and looked at his hands as he remembered what Derek told him. 

_**** “You have to tell Stilinski” Derek told Scott as he was looking at him. He was worried as Scott was, but he knew what they should do next despite him. “You have to tell him what’s really wrong with Stiles.” ****_

Scott sighed and stood up, made his way downstairs to the kitchen. It was Sunday and he felt so tired thinking about his friends and most importantly Stiles. “Any news?” he asked when he saw his mother, sitting on a chair and sipping from her coffee while overthinking about Stiles, worried about him. She saw him as one of her boys and not knowing where he was or knowing his condition was killing her.

“They’re still looking” Melissa answered her son with a deep breath into her lungs and out. “It’s past the 48-hour mark, but I guess if anyone’s going to be missing for two days and turn up just fine, it’s Stiles.” She softly but brokenly smiled.

“What about Isaac?” Scott asked again curiously, thinking about one of his friends who was majorly injured at the accident in the hospital.

Melissa stood up instead of answering the question and walked up to her son. She put her hand on his shoulder in a comforting way. “Maybe we should go by the hospital before you go to work, ha?”

Stella startled as Scott softly touched her shoulder, waking her up from her light and full of nightmare sleep. She looked up at the McCall family in front of her. She was in the hospital ever since she found out about Isaac’s situation, Stiles being missing and Barrow using Kira’s foxfire to get Nogitsune inside Stiles and her for a split second. It’s been two days since all of those nerve wrecking information bundle.

Allison and she never left the hospital ever since, staying there and waiting for Isaac to wake up.

Stella quickly straightened up under Scott’s anxious and worried eyes for Allison and her. He’s been wondering about one thing but somehow, he knew what the answer was going to be. But he found himself asking anyway. “Have you girls been here all night?” he asked, causing Allison nodded with her sleepy eyes and numb body.

Stella brushed her hair back, still shaken up by her current nightmare but looked up at Scott with sleepy eyes just like Allison. “We’ve been here for the last two days” Stella answered and then continued. “They won’t let us see him because we’re not family.” She licked her lips, shook her head slightly. “I’ve been telling them he doesn’t have any but still…”

“He’s got us” Melissa told Stella and then she pulled up a card from her uniform and showed it to them. “And I’ve got a key card.”

When Melissa opened the door, the first thing Stella noticed was Isaac laying on the hospital bed with all the machines he was connected to. She could hear the ERG machine, beeping but she gasped as she saw her one of her best friends like that, half of his body burned. She had no idea why he wasn’t healing or even opening his eyes. He had been through so much worse than that and he always came through but this time… This time something was different Stella had no idea what that was, and it was driving her crazy.

“Be quick” Melissa instructed. Scott and Allison nodded, stepping in.

But Allison noticed Stella wasn’t behind them and she was fixing to lean against the wall. “Ella, aren’t you coming?” she asked, stopping in front of the door, and looked at her cousin. Stella tried so hard not to look at Isaac as she turned to her cousin, hearing her question. She was just too tired. She didn’t even have the strength to look at her best friend laying there without moving and a soul crushing burn on one side of his face. She just couldn’t take it.

Lately, she didn’t even have any strength left to do that.

“No, I…” She paused, took a deep breath. “I don’t think I can do this.” Allison stopped for a while, worrying about her cousin but then nodded and walked over to Isaac’s bed with Scott by her side. She knew Stella was having some hard times lately. She didn’t get to talk to her about it or ask her about, but she knew and knowing it and knowing Stella wasn’t going to talk to her about it was only making things worse for Allison.

Meanwhile Stella stepped back and as the door closed behind Allison and Scott, she leaned against the wall with her eyes closed, taking a deep breath it. She was thinking of a way to ditch Aiden since she promised him that at least for tonight, she will be there. It was a school night and she had to sleep in a normal bed. And after Chris convincing Allison to come back home for the night, it was a lot easier to convince Stella to do the same. But Aiden managed to do it and now Stella was just trying to think how she could stay in the hospital and be there if… _When_ Isaac wakes up. 

But then she heard Melissa, snapping her away from her running wild thoughts. “How much sleep did you get?” she asked, worried about the young Argent.

“I don’t know” she answered with her exhausted voice that she’s been using for a while now. She opened her eyes, rubbed her face as she was looking up at the ceiling. While Allison was sleeping all day, she was up all-night texting with Aiden trying so hard not to fall asleep. But after a while she convinced Aiden to sleep because not everyone was Stella and not everyone was trying to escape from the nightmares and the all those feelings that she was trying to run away from. “Two, maybe three hours. Could be less. Could be more- no wait. Definitely can’t be more.”

“Stella, you need to sleep” Mama McCall said, worried. She could see the black bags underneath her eyes, she could see how tired she actually was. “You need to get rest.”

Stella took a deep breath, gave it out and looked at the young woman. “First I need to save Stiles.”

The other day, Aiden caught up with Stella near her locker. Seeing him walking next to her, Stella couldn’t help but let out of a tired scoff as she looked at him. “Aren’t you supposed to be in the locker room?” she asked with her exhausted voice. She was obviously still tired after yesterday being at the hospital all day. She covered the evidence of it with makeup essentials that she had with her and today she came to school because if she were at home she would be sleeping or losing her mind over a lot of things which were equal things to each other and both of them were the same thing in her book.

Also, it was the third day of Stiles being missing and she was high on alert, waiting for something to happen.

Aiden looked at her with his signature grin but today it also showed how proud he was since he was the one who convinced Stella not to sleep at the hospital at a Sunday night and come to school today instead of ditching and wait for Isaac again. He convinced… Well, forced Stella to sleep last night and he knew it was the longest sleep she had in a while. He let her ride his bike this morning to school to get off her mind of things and after a half an hour bike ride, and a sitting by the lake silently for few minutes, they arrived at school.

They had few different classes during the first few hours of school, but Aiden managed to catch her after them. And even though, she looked tired, she was a little bit more relaxed. Just a little bit... Probably because of the fact that she slept for five hours and not less than three this time.

“Ah, the coach doesn’t scare me” Aiden responded as he kept grinning up to his ears and continued. “Besides, it’s no fun without you there.” Stella smiled softly and shook her head in disbelief after Aiden’s comment which made him smile. It was the first actual smile he saw on her since everything went down with a little bit of foxfire. And then he noticed the frown on her beautiful face, she kept staring at him. “Hey, what’s wrong? What happened?”

As they kept walking down the halls, Stella shrugged. “Nothing, it’s just…” Right when she was about to explain herself, she paused. She stopped in the middle of the hallway, causing Aiden to stop as well. She tucked her hair behind her ear as she was thinking about their texting back when Stella was staying at the hospital with Allison for Isaac. “Did you really mean it when you said I owe you a date?” She nervously scoffed. They couldn’t get to talk about it because… Well, Stella couldn’t bring herself to ask about it but now… She couldn’t stop thinking about it, so she thought she could ask now. Besides, she had to think about something else other than the rabid fox that they had to deal with. “I mean… Were you serious?”

Aiden frowned, shook his head. “Pretty serious, yeah” he responded. It was a first for him too, but he found himself wanting to do it with her. And then with a thought, he paused. His brown eyes found hers and he spoke again. “Why, is there something wrong? We don’t have to do it if you don’t want to.”

“No, no, no. Just…” She let out another nervous chuckle. She thought about the life she was living in New York for a second. She couldn’t even compare, not even a single thing. “It’s just I’ve never been to a date and ‘dating’ is not really my thing and I actually don’t know what to feel or what to do with the thing I’m feeling about the fact that this is going to be my first date.”

As she remembered to breath, Aiden smiled. “It may be not dating in that kind of way” he said playfully and understanding what she’s been trying to say. He wasn’t the type of person who would ask a girl out anyway. In so many ways, Stella and he were just too alike. They had too many things in common in so many ways. “I don’t know… just think about it as two friends who have sex and are too close by the way, going out to eat something.” He frowned playfully. “I mean, I think. I don’t really know how those date things work. But we are smart. You’re smarter than I am so… We’ll figure out.”

Stella laughed. She actually sincerely laughed for the first time in a long time, hearing the way Aiden put their ‘date’ into words. Meanwhile, Aiden realized how long it has been since the last time she heard her laughter. Stella bit her lip to contain her laugher and she looked at him, her heart pounding in her chest. “Alright” Stella said, nodding with a smile. “After all of these ends and we came out with a victory… I owe you a date.”

Aiden smiled lightly. “After we save Stiles.”

Stella smiled back. “After we save Stiles.” They started walking again but only few seconds later, Aiden stopped again. The smile disappeared and he frowned making Stella quickly look at him as she stopped walking near him. “Hey, what’s wrong? Aiden, what- Did you hear something?”

“Yeah, it’s…” The werewolf stopped and listened more, focused more. Then he frowned more as he looked at Stella. “It’s one of your emitters.”

Stella knotted, not knowing why one of their emitters were even here in the first place but as she pushed that question back, she asked another. “Where is it coming from?”

Aiden listened more to be sure and then looked at Stella. “From the basement.”

“Listen up!” Coach yelled after blowing his whistle to get everyone’s attention on him and when he was sure everyone was listening, he continued. “If one of you sees Aiden Steiner, report to me. I hate the ones who skip classes.” Hearing Coach and being able to guess where his brother was right now instead of the locker room, Ethan rolled his eyes. “Also…” Coach’s volume got higher. “Anybody catches the slightest glimpse of Stilinski; you contact the first available teacher.” No one said anything back, so Coach shouted. “Got it?!”

“Yes, Coach!”

“There’s a card on my desk for Isaac Lahey” Coach Finstock continued. “And every one of you losers is not only going to just sign it, you’re going to write a personal message so profound and deep…” He pointed his eye with the pen that he was holding. “… it’s gonna bring a tear to Coach’s eye. Who’s first?” Danny stood up from the bench he was sitting on, making Coach smile. “Ah, Danny!” Coach screamed after him, praising him. “That’s how you do it, buddy! Keep it PG.”

“No Stiles, no demonic ninjas” Ethan told Scott, focusing back to their problem. They were standing behind the locker where they were mostly on their own. The alpha looked up at Ethan from the bench he was sitting on as he continued. “Things are getting too quiet.”

“Yeah, I know” Scott agreed. He knew how nerve-wrecking this was. “It’s making me nervous, too.”

And at the same time Aiden heard the sound, the metallic pulsing, Scott and Ethan heard it too. They paused, stopped, straightened up as they frowned in confusion. “Do you hear that?” Ethan asked.

“It’s an emitter” Scott responded, frowning, not understanding what was happening. “One of Argents’.” They quickly got up and ran to the back door, getting out of the locker room where they bumped into Stella and Aiden who was also looking confused as hell.

“Do you know why one of your emitters are here at the school, in the basement?” Ethan curiously questioned, looking at the young girl who looked as much as lost he was and the rest of them were.

Stella shook her head no. “Not even a clue” she answered, looking at the werewolf that she was in better terms with now. She turned her head to look at the staircase that was going down to the basement. “But we have to figure it out.” She looked back at them. “Because I know it’s not Chris or Allison.”

Three werewolves and one human went downstairs to the basement and they saw Stiles, holding the emitter between his hands. As he heard their footsteps, he turned around to face them. He looked normal, he looked like himself, but Stella felt like something was wrong.

“Okay, I know what you guys are thinking but it’s me” Stiles said, putting his hands up in the air like he was turning himself in, trying to get them to trust him. “I swear to God, it’s me.”

The minute he stopped talking, twins growled and ran past Stella and Scott, reaching up to Stiles. Stella was shocked, frozen due to how fast things have happened. She could only realize what was happening when Aiden grabbed Stiles by the throat and pulled him up.

She quickly ran up to Aiden, put her hand on his shoulder. “Aiden, stop!” she demandingly shouted. She looked at Stiles who was gasping for air, trying to breath. “Stop!”

Seeing it wasn’t working, Scott pulled Stella behind slowly not wanting her to get hurt and looked at the twins. “Stop!” he shouted as he gripped Aiden tight and threw it away from Stiles. “I said, stop!” Ethan turned to looked at him, growled at him seeing the way he threw his brother but then Scott glowed his red eyes and growled back two times louder and dominant than him. Ethan looked down feeling like a scolded puppy, Stella took a deep breath seeing Aiden letting go off Stiles.

“Stella, it’s me” Stiles repeated himself, looking at the young girl and then his hazel eyes found Scott and continued. He pointed himself as he kept talking, telling them. “Scott, I swear it’s me.” He lightly shook his head. “I don’t know where I’ve been the last three days or what I’ve been doing, but this is me. I promise.”

“You know what happened at the hospital?” Aiden asked, getting back on his feet as Stella helped him get up off the ground.

“I know more than that.” He walked over to a bag and leaned down to grab a blueprint map from it. He pulled it up to show everyone. “You see this?” He put the map open on the table and continued. “It’s a blueprint of the hospital’s electrical wiring. You see all these markings? That’s my handwriting.” They walked up to Stiles, looked down at the map. “I know I did this. I caused the accident.” He pulled up the bag and placed it on the blueprint. “And everything in this bag, it’s all stuff that could be part of something bigger.”

Aiden grabbed a sharp tool which looked like a falcate from the bag, looked at Stiles. “What the hell have you been up to?” he questioned with horror in his voice.

“I think something worse” Stiles responded, looking at Aiden. “A lot worse.”

Stella let out a sarcastic laughter and rolled her eyes. “Yeah,” she breathed out. She was happy that Stiles was healthy and all, but she couldn’t stop thinking about Isaac. “If what you’ve been planning is worse than the accident back in the hospital and the way Isaac looks, then…” She looked at him, pressing her lips together. “God, save us all, right?”

All Stiles was able to do was look at Stella like he was trying to apologize but Stella’s eyes were already back on the bag in front of her.

Lydia started walking slower as she saw the man her mother was talking to from a distance. She frowned and when the man turned his head to look at her, she started walking faster. Seeing Peter Hale in Beacon High was suspicious, and she wondered what the hell he could be doing here. What the hell did he want?

But when she stood right beside her mother, Peter was long gone like he was never there to begin with. She looked around to see if she could see him but she failed and then she looked at her mother with confusion. “Why were you talking to him?” she curiously asked.

“Because he started talking to me” Ms. Martin explained with a light smile on her face. “He’s from the health department.”

Lydia parted her lips, let out a light chuckle in disbelief. “Oh, really?” she couldn’t help but ask sarcastically. “That’s what he said?”

“Yes, really” Ms. Martin responded. “They’re scheduling hearing tests with the students.”

“Hearing tests?” Lydia repeated, raising her brows slowly as she tried to think about Peter’s motive this time. She got the message. She wasn’t stupid but she was just wondering why. “He was talking about hearing?”

“Yes, hearing” Ms. Martin said, repeating for her daughter once again enunciating. “I’m guessing we should sign you up.” When Lydia looked at her again, she showed her the white paper she was holding. Smiled. “He gave me his card.”

Lydia snatched the card away from her hand. “Mom” she said, reading what’s on it. “This is a piece of paper with a phone number written on it.”

“I know” Ms. martin responded with a meaningful grin on her beautiful face. “Still got it.” Lydia watched her mother walk away from her in disbelief as she wrinkled up the card between her fists with frustration.

“What the hell were you doing? Building a terminator?” Aiden questioned Stiles again as Ethan and he were taking things out of the mystery bag, looking surprised and worried at the same time with each material.

“Thank you for that” Stiles responded, taking it mostly as a compliment as he was being sarcastic.

“Guys, this is a map” Stella murmured, taking a white map from the bag. She unfolded the map open and laid it on the table so that everyone could see it. They all leaned into it, looking at it as they were all focused, trying to figure out what was it all about.

Aiden frowned, pointed the red marked area on the map. “Isn’t that the cross-country trail?” he asked curiously.

“That’s the Tate car” Stella said, remembering the area that was red marked on the map. She frowned, trying to think about why Stiles… why the Nogitsune would mark that part of the woods. “Where Malia Tate’s family died.”

“You mean that’s where her father put the steel-jawed traps” Stiles murmured, looking down at the map. And in that moment, they knew they had to be quick. As they all made their way to the upstairs to the parking lot, Stella followed them with a disturbing feeling in her stomach.

Elevator bell dinged and the doors slid open, showing Chris Argent that the door to his apartment was partly open and that was the first thing he’s noticed. He took out his gun from his belt, being prepared as always. He aimed, thinking something was wrong because he knew the girls were supposed to be at school and neither of them would leave the door open.

He made his way inside his house with slow and quiet steps, looking around, being on alert and then he entered his study which’s door was also slightly open. He noticed the emitter that bogged into the table. He frowned, taking down his gun and took a deep breath.

“Lose something?” he heard someone saying and as he turned around to see the source, the uninvited guest twisted Argent’s arm, causing him to drop his gun onto the floor. His claws were on Chris’ throat caused him to grunt, but Chris took out the spare gun in his back pocket and put it against Derek’s head.

They were both panting as Chris parted his lips. “Why are you breaking into my apartment?” he asked, leaning his head a little bit back to look at him since Derek was a little taller than he was, and his claws were still on his throat.

“Why are you leaving emitters in my loft?” Derek asked back angrily. Those two may have a truce going on between them but they were definitely not friends.

“I have no idea why that would be in your loft” Chris answered, pulling his gun back and watching Derek make his claws go away. Argent put his hands on his throat, rubbing it to let go off the itching of the claws as he walked up to his desk. “I spent entirety of the last three days trying to find Stiles.”

“Any luck?”

“No” Chris responded.

“Me either” Derek said and after a while of silence, he continued. “Okay, we’re both trying to find Stiles. Mind if I ask what you planned on doing if you find him?”

Chris raised his one eyebrow up and looked at Derek as he parted his lips. “Well, that depends on which Stiles I find” he answered.

Stiles parked his blue jeep with tires squealing and as soon as the car stopped, he climbed out and with Scott and Stella behind him, he ran up to the Coach he spotted. “Coach!” he screamed so that Coach would notice him.

“Stilinski?” Coach was out of words, surprised to see him all of a sudden. “Whoa, where…?”

But Stiles quickly interrupted him. “Coach, listen close.”

“Broken” Chris announced, viewing the locked closet inside his study. He slowly opened the closet door, pulling it to himself and frowned seeing a locked black case inside it. “This isn’t mine.” Derek made a move to the case, but Chris stopped him with his hand. “Careful.” Argent checked behind the case, seeing if it was attached to something and when he thought it was safe, he grabbed the case and put it on his desk. He opened up the case, confused with the things he saw. Because the case was full of money. He breathed in.

“How much do you think that is?” Derek asked, his confused gaze moving on the money and the Argent.

“150,000” Chris answered. It was money from their deal with Katashi and that was the problem in this scenario. “But it doesn’t make sense.” He looked away from the money to Derek. “We never took the money.”

“Whose money is it?” Derek asked, looking at Chris.

“It belongs to a yakuza named Katashi” he responded. “He has a nickname.”

“You mean something like…” Chris and Derek quickly looked at the source of voice coming from the entrance of the study, seeing Agent McCall holding up a see-through evidence bag in his hands and two cops following him behind. “Silverfinger.”

“Where did you get that?” Chris curiously questioned in shock, seeing Katashi’s finger that gave him the nick name, in the evidence bag.

Agent McCall slightly lifted his head up and looked at Chris before he answered. “Off Katashi’s dead body.”

“Scott!” Stiles shouted, calling Scott over to them. The True alpha let go off Kira and quickly walked up to them while Stiles turned around. He was trying to stop people from going any further since they didn’t know what they were running to. “Stop, stop, stop!” he kept shouting, causing the others to look at him. “Everyone, stop!”

As Stiles was looking down on the leaves to find out what he was looking for, Coach Finstock put his gaze on the young man, feeling confused and worried.

But then they heard the young Argent’s voice. “Stilinski, what the hell is that?” Stella asked, pointing a spot on the ground. Stiles looked at where she was pointing at and saw a set of rusty chains.

He grabbed it, pulled it to himself really careful but it turned out that it was just a rusty chain.

Coach Finstock started a round of sarcastic clapping. “Congratulations, Stilinski, you found a length of chain” he said, taking a step forward. His gaze moved on the others in expectations, continued. “Can somebody now, please, tell me what the hell’s going on?”

But then he tripped to a white, so thin that was almost invisible rope.

“Hey, coach!” Scott yelled as he saw what was happening but it was too late as an arrow hit Coach, flying over to him from an unknown distance. It went through Coach’s stomach, causing him to get in a little shock.

“Oh, crap” Coach murmured as he fell down on his back. Seeing what has happened, Stella slid on the ground, reaching him. She quickly broke the end of the arrow, sitting on her knees next to his body.

Realizing Coach was extremely, quiet for a while, everyone gathered around.

Allison stopped Lydia who was reaching for the door handle and looked at her eyes. “While it’s smart to bring me with you, I still think the rest of this is totally insane” she reminded her once again, trying to get her to back off the plan before it was too late.

“I tried to find Stiles and I led everyone into a mental institution” Lydia firmly reacted, looking at her best friend. “Stella somehow found where Stiles actually was, but she doesn’t know how she knew or how to explain it.” She took a deep breath. “I call what I did a colossal failure.” Allison cleared her throat, pressed her lips together, not agreeing with her. But Lydia shook her head, determined to do this. “Look, I just need to figure this out and he is the only one offering help.”

“Peter doesn’t offer help” Allison argued, thinking about the times before. “He offers a chance for you to be manipulated into giving him what he wants.”

“Fine” Lydia said a little louder. “Let’s see what he wants.” She grabbed the door handle, swiped the door open and revealed Peter who was apparently waiting for them.

He smiled, looked at the two girls. “The Hunter and the banshee” he announced, enjoying this situation. “Ladies, come in.”

Coach’s state of shock lasted for only few seconds and then he started screaming like a lunatic again and all Stella wanted to do was punch him in the face and shut him up but instead, she took a deep breath and brushed her hair back, trying to calm down. “Get it out of me! Get it out of me! Get it out of me!” Coach kept screaming while Stiles was pressuring the wound, near the arrow without hurting him more. “Oh God, I’m gonna die.”

Stella was looking at Coach in shocked. “How can you move so much in this situation?” Stella murmured, definitely surprised with the man. He had a freaking arrow in his stomach and for a guy who had a freaking arrow in his stomach, Coach was definitely moving and talking a lot.

“Get it out!” he screamed again “I’m gonna die!”

“Coach, you’re not gonna die” Stiles said, looking down at him.

“Coach!” Stella shouted, getting his attention on her. “A little advice from me. It will hurt less if you stop moving!” She rolled her eyes and looked at the Coach who was still screaming and moving. If that arrow was in Scott, then she would take it out nice and slow and she wouldn’t probably have to but now if she were to pull it out, it would only cause Coach more pain and more panic than he was already in and also the wound would bleed more which was something she didn’t want in this situation.

“Stay, still coach!” Aiden told him, trying to help Stella but not like Coach was listening to any of them. “An ambulance is coming.”

“Get it out! I’m gonna die!”

Stella rolled her eyes and looked at the boys around her who were her friends. “How are you guys dealing with him all day? All I wanna do is punch him till he blacks out.” Stella was taking one of his lessons which was Economics but that was once in a week. These guys had to see him and hear him all week, every day.

Coach kept screaming. “Get it out, get it out!”

Stella looked at Scott, exhausted. “Scott do something or swear to God, I’m gonna do something and it’s not gonna be pretty” she shouted with a low voice. Scott nodded, showing her that he understood. He looked up the twins, asking them to get everyone away from them with his eyes.

Aiden looked at the crowd, understanding him. “Get back! Get back! Give him some room! Get back!” he screamed, waving his hands to get them away from Coach. Ethan and Danny helped him, and eventually rest of the students walked away and Scott grabbed his hand and focused on the pain.

Stella immediately saw the black veins rising up from his hands to his face. He gasped, feeling his pain. He probably took too much because Stella could see Scott was having some troubles of breathing. She also knew he visited Isaac again in the hospital this morning and took some of his pain again like he did on Sunday.

Yeah, that wasn’t probably helping him either.

“Hey” Stella said, making Scott look up to her. “Let it go. Don’t go so hard on yourself.” Scott let go off Coach’s hand and then they all realized it was too quiet. Coach wasn’t screaming anymore.

“I think he just passed out” Scott took a guess.

Stella sighed in relief and pulled her bloody hands away from Coach’s wound, placing them on her lap facing up as she sat back on her knees. “Better than screaming” she murmured. Her forehead was covered with sweats and her hair was all over her face, but she couldn’t push them away because of the blood on her hands. She looked up at Aiden. “Hey, can you help me with this?” she asked, trying to breath out her hair away. Aiden softly smiled, nodded and as he walked up to brush her hair back.

Stiles stopped pressuring the wound like Stella. He sat back, looked down at his bloody and shaky hands. “I could have killed him” he whispered with his voice was shaking as well as his hands. “I could have killed him, right?”

“But you didn’t” Stella told him, looking at his eyes more clearly now since her hair wasn’t in the way anymore. “You just made him scream like a lunatic and in his case, it’s not that abnormal for him. I guess.”

“But what if it was his head or his throat?” Stiles questioned as Stella sighed and gulped down, getting back to pressuring his wound because the ambulance was running late.

“But it wasn’t” Scott assured him. “And he’s going to be alright.”

And then they heard the sirens wailing in the distance. “I think I just heard an ambulance coming” Aiden informed them, his face was slightly turned towards the direction he was hearing the sirens from.

Stiles took a deep breath, gave it out. “And my dad…”

“So…” Chris said, breaking the awkward silence between Derek and him who were at the police station, handcuffed to the bench they were sitting on after Agent McCall payed them a visit. “I don’t suppose you have any idea why Stiles would frame us for murder?”

Derek slightly shook his head. “I didn’t think Stiles was smart enough to frame us for murder” he responded.

“To be honest, I’m not entirely convinced that’s why we’re here” Chris said, looking around. The handcuffs were too tight to hurt his wrists but there was nothing he could do about it for the moment.

Derek frowned. “What do you mean?”

“McCall is going to come out here any minute and probably talk attorneys” Chris started his explanation, ignoring his question. He paused for a while and turned enough the handcuffs allowed him and looked at Derek. “Say you’ve agreed to allow mine to represent you.”

“Why should I trust your attorney?” Derek asked, frowning more. He could feel the rage inside him for some reason. “My mom trusted you and look what happened.”

Chris fought his urge to roll his eyes, parted his lips. “I am assuming you learned the truth about Stella but it’s not about her. It’s not about me. It’s not about this” Chris firmly told him and, without giving Derek time to react to what he has just said, he continued. “You’re gonna do as I told because I’m not calling my attorney yet. I just want more time.”

“To do what?” Derek asked, knowing the situation they were in, so they postponed the other thing he wanted to talk about to later.

Chris sighed. “To figure out what we’re really doing here.”

Peter took a step towards the two girls and pointed Allison with his head as he was still looking at Lydia. “She goes” he directed making Allison smile sarcastically and looked down while Lydia put a grin on her face that disagreed with Peter.

“The last time I was alone with you, I almost bled out on a lacrosse field” she reminded him. She breathed in, gave it out and continued strictly. “She stays.”

“Do you actually think I was trying to kill you when I bit you?” Peter questioned, frowning playfully. He chuckled, took another step towards Lydia, and continued. “You were my backup plan, remember? Not to mention, the bite is what brought out your nascent abilities. You think power like that was going to come out on its own?” He shook his head, looked at Lydia with sparks of joy in his eyes. Clicked his tongue. “I’m the spark that lit your fire, sweetheart.”

“You attacked her and nearly killed her” Allison interrupted, reminding him once again, looking at him. His interpretation of the events wasn’t how Allison or Lydia remembered things.

Peter shrugged. “Power doesn’t come without a little pain and struggle.”

“I didn’t ask for it” Lydia argued as a response.

“But you’re embracing it now, aren’t you?” Peter observed, obviously enjoying her situation.

Allison kept her gaze on the former alpha. “How about the fact that you brainwashed her and used her to bring yourself back to life?” she reminded him once again.

“So that I could be here today to help you master your abilities!” Peter smiled. “Isn’t it amazing how things come full circle?”

Allison chuckled sarcastically, looked at Lydia. “He’s insane. We’re leaving.” Lydia nodded, grabbing the hand Allison gave out to her. They turned around, started walking away from Peter but he had something else in his mind.

“You want the truth, Lydia?” Peter asked, shouting behind them. As they heard his obvious bait question, Lydia stopped with Allison by her side. “It’s not the scream that gives you power. All the scream does is help drown out the noise, allowing you to hear what you really need to. I can help you focus your hearing.” Lydia turned around, looked at Peter. She heard the last part echoing through her ear, and she was constantly thinking about the night Stiles went missing and Stella was able to find her, but she couldn’t.

Allison looked at Peter, raised her eyebrows and parted her lips. “But you want something in return” she guessed but it came out more of a question than a statement, knowing Peter.

“No, I’m dedicating my life to helping out narcissistic teenage girls” Peter responded in return with sarcasm. Then he pulled a box to himself from the corner of the table and broke the smile on his face. “Of course, I want something in return.” He opened the box, shook it to make the claws in it, Talia’s claws to fall onto the table and then smiled as he looked at Allison. “I could ask Stella to do it and after few sarcastic, annoying comments, she would probably help me since we don’t really have a history- No, wait.” He narrowed his eyes and shook his index finger playfully and continued. “I killed her mother. We do have history there, but she would probably still do it if she could but, you know, she’s not like…” He looked at Lydia. “… you.”

Allison frowned, falling right into his trap. “What do you mean?” she asked, confused.

Peter slightly grinned. “Despite of what Jennifer said, she is not actually a banshee” he started explaining but then stopped himself. “Sorry, she _is_ a banshee but just a different kind.” He breathed in. “I have no idea what made her that way. In her situation, like I told to Stiles once, it’s all about rumors and stories that we can’t confirm. But because of that… She knows how to listen; she knows what to do and her ability to walk into others’ minds…? Yes, she is very dangerous and gifted, but she is not the banshee to do what I want.”

“What do you want?” Lydia asked with a low volume voice, frowned softly.

“My sister, Talia… before she died, she stole a memory from me” Peter explained, looking at Lydia. “It’s something only a very powerful alpha can do… And that memory is locked inside those claws.” He slightly and teasingly tilted his head. “I want you to hear that memory and tell me.”

Stella watched the paramedics to get Coach inside the back of the ambulance on a stretcher but also looked at Stiles who was hugging his father at the moment out the corner of her eyes. Her anxiety and the disturbing feeling in her stomach were growing with each passing second but she pushed them back and looked at the paramedic Carter who was asking her questions. 

“I broke the tip of it so it wouldn’t pressure hard on him” Stella answered her question. She sighed, playing with her fingers nervously but as she was talking, she was sure of herself, confident. It was just… There was something else that was bothering her. “I didn’t try to take the arrow because it would make the bleeding so much worse. We just pressured the wound, there was nothing else we could do.”

Carter smiled, nodded as the two paramedics closed the back doors of the ambulance. “How did you learn all that?” she asked. “There is not much else who knows what to do during these kinds of injuries and situations. You look pretty calm.”

Stella shrugged with an uncomfortable scoff. “My uncle is a hunter, he used to take me and my cousin to hunting trips” she explained. It wasn’t exactly a lie and it wasn’t exactly the truth either, but she was pretty damn good at it after all those years of practice. “He thought us what to do if we shot one of us by accident or hurt ourselves in any way.”

Carter smiled again and looked at Stella before she sat on the passenger seat. “It’s a good thing that your uncle thought you that” she said. “You may have saved his life.”

As the ambulance drove away, Stella sighed in relief and walked over to Aiden and Scott who were busy looking at the things in Stiles’ Jeep’s trunk. “The ambulance is gone with the Coach. What are you guys doing?” she asked as she frowned and stood right next to Aiden who looked at Stella and then showed her what they were looking at, the thing he was holding which was a blue wrapping paper.

“This is the same wrapping paper we used for Coach’s birthday present” Scott reminded Stella as he looked down at the paper one more time and then looked at Stella and Aiden who were standing near each other with a frown on each of their faces.

“Wasn’t that William Barrow’s thing?” Aiden questioned, looking at Stella as he thought about the article. His gaze moved to Scott as he continued. “A bomb made from nails and bolts all wrapped in a birthday present. Where did it go off?”

Scott and Stella knew the answer, reading the article before. Stella looked down at Stiles’ black mystery bag and Scott looked at Stiles who was still talking to his father. Meanwhile Stella parted her lips and looked at Aiden. “On a school bus” she answered underneath her breath.

While Scott called Mr. Yukimura who he knew he was at school to let him know, Stella and Aiden ran to Sheriff to inform him.

“Out of the way! Out of the way!” Sheriff shouted. After Stella’s bomb warning, he drove to the school as fast he could with deputies following him. “Get out of the way! Move, everyone back! Get away from the bus! Get back now!” While they were trying to get students away from the school bus and trying to get them to the safety, Stella and the others were standing behind the barrier watching the cops do their job. “Back those kids up! Move!”

“We wait for the bomb squad” Scott heard the sheriff talking with all the murmuring happening behind them. It was hard to focus through the chaos and panic, but he was the true alpha. It didn’t take too long for him to focus and hear their conversation from afar.

“I’m a certified HDT” Parrish said, looking at the sheriff. “Two years in the army. I can at least find out if this thing’s real.” Sheriff paused for a while but then gave him a head nod and looked at the students who were still running around. He looked at the deputies who were trying to get them behind the barriers.

Deputy Parrish walked over to the yellow bus, looked at Sheriff for approval one more time before he got inside the bus. Sheriff gave him another nod, giving him the red light to get inside. The deputy took a deep breath walked inside the school bus, walked towards Jared, the student who was holding the supposed bomb in a wrapped gift box.

Stella was biting her nails nervously, her arms crossed in front of her chest with Aiden, Ethan, Stiles and Scott by her side. She gave out a breath full of worry. “Something’s not right” she couldn’t help but murmur, causing Aiden to frown as he was the only one who heard that.

He looked at the young girl and leaned in near her face. “What do you mean?” he asked, whispering as he was worried of her. Stella parted her lips to answer but nothing came out as she wasn’t sure what was wrong, or she didn’t know at all. She closed her lips, pressed them together and then opened them again.

“I don’t know” she finally said. “I…” She exhaled between her lips. “Never mind.” Stella looked back at the bus and then she saw the movement. She slowly hit Aiden with her elbow, getting his attention back on her that he never drifted away in the first place. Stella pointed Parrish and Jared with her head. “Hey, listen to him. What is he saying?”

As Aiden focused on Parrish, inside the bus, he heard and repeated to Stella what was happening but then he heard Parrish’s voice over the police radio that was on the Sheriff. “It’s not a bomb, sir, but there is something in the box” he informed them and then walked over to the wind shield. Rested a metal object against the wall, letting them see over the window. It was Sheriff’s name tab that was supposed to be on his desk in his office right now.

Stella sharply gasped as she understood what was happening. She had no idea how she knew the truth but she was so sure of it as she called out for Stiles’ father. “Sheriff!” she shouted for him to hear her as the guys near her looked at her, trying to understand what was going in her mind. Sheriff walked over to Stella fast, thinking. Stella didn’t even give him a chance to ask what was happening. She quickly parted her lips. “Was there a package delivery today to the station?” she asked. The hurry in her voice combined with Sheriff’s suspicions and he quickly reached over to his walkie talkie thingy on his shoulder, thinking about the delivery today which they were told it was just printer cartridges, batteries for the next black out and stuff.

And now that he looked it again, he knew exactly what it was. “My God” Sheriff murmured, looked around and then Stella. “There is a bomb, but not here.”

As Stiles and Scott went after the sheriff to the police station, Stella waited for them to get inside the car and drive away. The minute they disappeared after the squad cars, she gave out a breath between her lips and started walking towards her Audi without saying anything to Aiden and Ethan. Twins shared a confused look and then Aiden waved him goodbye, walked behind her. “Stella!” Aiden shouted, ran after her and then quickly caught up with her.

She took a deep breath and gave it out as she thought how she could get rid of him now. He shouldn’t have been following her. Not right now... “Aiden, you really can’t come with me right now” she nervously reacted as she could feel the anxiety rising inside her. Something was bothering her and she had no idea what do to about it.

Aiden grabbed her by the arm, stopped her and looked right in the eyes. “Okay, tell me what’s going on” he worriedly demanded. Stella looked back at him, biting her lower lip. For a moment, she didn’t say anything. Aiden let go off her arm, thinking maybe she could answer him this way but the minute he let go, she turned around. She started walking again, seeing her car in the distance. Aiden rolled his eyes and went after her. “Stella!”

“I have to go somewhere” Stella eventually responded, not giving too much information. Her gaze moved to him as she kept walking with fast steps. “And you coming with me…”

Aiden interrupted her as they stood right next to the black Audi. “… Is absolutely what I should be doing right now” he completed her sentence not in the way she wanted. He scoffed. “In fact, this is exactly what I have to do.” Stella rolled her eyes but not to lose more time, she didn’t say anything. She sat behind the wheel with a roll of her eyes and when she saw Aiden was on the passenger seat next to her in the front, she started the engine.

Stella hit the gas pedal pretty fast, Aiden held on the first thing he could find not to shaken up by the sudden speed and when they were on the road, he kept looking at her, asking her a silent question. Stella knew what that question was. So, she sighed as she took a turn and parted her lips. “I need to get something from the apartment” she murmured. She was driving, not caring about the red lights on the road since she had to be faster.

Aiden gasped, understanding what was on Stella’s mind. “You knew” he murmured, looked at Stella who was looking ahead. Stella gulped down, focusing on the road, and taking another final turn to arrive at her house. “You knew it wasn’t really him.”

“I had my doubts” Stella answered as she parked in front of the apartment and quickly climbed out and made her way into the elevators with Aiden behind her.

“So why did you stop me?” Aiden question with a frown when they were inside the elevator cabin. Stella pressed her floor and looked at Aiden, brushed her hair back as they started to go up to their floow.

“Because he is still Stiles” she answered. She never talked about it to anyone but Stiles was one of her best friends in the entire world. She cared about him. He was important to her. And that’s why thinking about what she was thinking was so extremely hard for her. She sighed and watched the screen that was showing the floor number that they were currently on. “Besides… I needed to know what he was planning.”

The elevator doors slid open, Aiden looked Stella as they got out of the elevator and walked inside the apartment. He watched her open the door with her key. “Did you?” he asked, not moving his gaze away from her.

Stella opened the door quickly and made her way to her uncle’s study. “I have my theories” she murmured, not giving much information once again. She stepped inside the study but before she walked over to the drawer, she noticed the piece of paper on the desk. She grabbed the note which was obviously from her uncle. She frowned and started reading it.

**_Derek and I are suspects to the murder of Katashi. They took us to the station. Find Stiles._ **

Stella let another breath out of her lungs, worried about those two and since she knew there was a bomb at the station, but Scott and Stiles were already there and there was nothing she could do at this moment. So, she put the note back for Allison to read it and made her way to the drawer she meant to do in the first place. She didn’t have time to text Allison. She had to move fast. 

Aiden saw the note, read it. “Are you gonna do something about it?” he asked, turning to look at her with the note between his fingers.

“No, Scott got it” Stella murmured, shaking her head. “And my uncle knows what to do. He can take care of himself and the dumbass with him. I have to do what he told me. I need to take care of Stiles.” Aiden moved his brows, put the note back on the desk while Stella pulled the drawer to herself and looked at the thing inside it.

She prayed that she didn’t have to use it but yeah, that’s exactly what she needed.

“I got mine” Allison said looking down at the picture on her phone and then back at Lydia who was in the passenger seat. The same time as Stella and Aiden were leaving the Argent apartment and back on the road once more, now headed to the vet clinic, Allison and Lydia were sitting inside Allison’s black Toyota covering themselves from the heavy and loud raid pouring on the car after a very surprising day and their meeting with Peter. After Lydia told Allison about the things she heard from Talia’s claws, the memory that she stole from Peter, both of them were still in shock, couldn’t believe what Lydia’s heard. “Did you find yours?”

“Yeah” Lydia murmured as she zoomed on Malia’s picture on her phone screen and then looked at the picture of Peter that Allison had on her phone screen.

“Peter and Malia?” Allison asked in disbelief, shocked.

“Father and daughter” Lydia answered, still looking down at the phone screens that they were holding side to side. But she was also thinking about something else she accidently heard from the claws. She wasn’t sure if it was actually a stolen memory or not. She wasn’t sure if she should talk to Allison about it but then she decided to do it. She knew she has to. It was about her family after all. “Actually… You know what? I’ve heard something else, too. I’m not sure if it was stolen but it was in Talia’s memories so…” Allison raised her eyebrows, asking what it is with her expression. Lydia pressed her lips together and nervously continued, asking. “Do you have a picture of Stella on your phone?”

Allison nodded. She opened a beautiful picture of her cousin smiling, a piece of memory from their time together in San Francisco but then realized what it could mean, she paused and looked at her best friend. “Wait a second” she said, blinking her eyes in shock. She thought about all those times how she didn’t know Stella’s father’s identity like Stella. She always had a feeling that her father knew but she never got a confirmation and now what Lydia was trying to say… It was insane. “You don’t mean… Peter and Stella, right?”

But Lydia shook her head no, looking at Allison with her wide-open green eyes. “No, no” she murmured. “Not Peter and Stella.” She looked down at her phone, found the picture she was looking for and showed it to Allison, putting her phone next to hers which still had Stella’s picture on the screen. Allison gasped, looking at the other picture, seeing the green eyes but the face structure that looked similar to her cousin. “Derek and Stella.”

“So, you’re saying…” She couldn’t finish the sentence. Her brain was thinking on full speed but then she saw Lydia nodding softly.

“She is not just an Argent” Lydia said. She was talking calmly but thinking about the Argent family and what they were doing, a little bit of fear and daze in her voice was only understandable. “She is a Hale.”

“I’m not going to leave you alone with that psychotic fox spirit, are you crazy?” Aiden shouted when they were paused in front of Aiden’s house, back in the woods. Stella looked outside at the twin’s house. “Stella-”

Young Argent turned to look at Aiden and parted her lips softly. She understood him but she had to do this alone. “Do you remember the date I owe you?” Stella asked quickly, interrupting him. “If you want it to happen, then you get out of the car and let me do this alone.” She was talking really fast but understandable because she needed him to get out of the car and she needed to get to the animal clinic as fast as possible. He remembered Scott’s text to her with lots of typos since he was typing really fast, but the main idea was this:

**McCall – The bomb went off. One officer down. As far as I’ve heard Derek and Argent are safe but still are held captive. We are heading to the vet clinic because the onis are after Stiles and the sun is going down. Maybe we can protect him there.**

This was the message would look like without any typos. So, she had to hurry up. She was almost out of time but Aiden wasn’t making it easy for her. “No” he opposed, slightly shaking his head.

Stella fought with the urge to roll her eyes. Instead, she smiled and leaned in to place a soft kiss on his lips, holding his cheeks. She pulled away and looked into his eyes. “Aiden, I know you’re worried and I get that but you should also get the fact that I know what I’m doing” she softly told him. Aiden dropped his shoulders, knowing he wasn’t going to be able to change her mind, his eyes on hers. “And I know you don’t trust Stiles but trust me. Please. I have to do this. And I have to do this alone.”

Aiden sighed. Stella could see the conflict of his feelings inside him. He closed his eyes but after a deep breathes when he opened them back and looked at Stella, she knew what he his decision was.

Stella quickly climbed out of her car with deep but quiet breathes and she closed the door behind her. She looked down at her sword hanging on her belt and, without letting herself think about Aiden, she walked over to the door. Opened it very slowly, not making any sound and as she closed the door behind her, she could hear Stiles’ voice, but she knew it wasn’t Stiles.

Not anymore.

“You should have done your reading, Scott.” Stella pressed her lips together, walking slowly through the entrance to the examining room that they were in. “See, a Nogitsune feeds off chaos, strife and pain.” Since she wanted to hear what he has to say and waiting for the right time to walk in, she was walking a lot slower than she was probably supposed to. “This morning, you took it from Isaac again, then you took it from Coach. And then from a dying deputy. All that pain. You took it all.” Stiles put his hands harshly on Scott’s face, forcing him to look at him, stretching his cheeks back. “Now, give it to me.” Choking and panting noises from inside reached to Stella which caused her to walk a little faster. “You really have to learn, Scott. You really have to learn not to trust a fox. Mm. Know why?”

Stella stepped inside the examining room, not going to let him hurt Scott more. She seemed calm and cool, but her heart was pounding. She didn’t care as her brown eyes found the Nogitsune who was wearing one of her best friend’s face. “Because they’re tricksters” the young Argent answered for him, like she was talking about a daily chore. She shrugged; Scott turned to look at Stella even though Stiles was holding his shoulder harsh enough to hurt him. He seemed surprised to find Stella not that surprised about Stiles being not himself. “They’ll fool you” she continued, ignoring his expression. “In fact, they’ll fool everyone.” She took few steps inside the room, looked at Stiles and grinned. “Well, not everyone.” She waggled her eyebrows, scoffed and then added. “Obviously.”

A sick grin appeared on Stiles’ pale face. He straightened up and looked directly at Stella. “Oh, aren’t you the clever Argent?” he commented with his husky Nogitsune voice while Stella kept her gaze on him, observed him. Stiles being the bad guy, him being the Nogitsune felt so awkward. Everything besides the blue bags under his eyes, psychotic expression, and sick smile… He was one of her closest friends, Stiles Stilinski.

Stella had to remind herself that he wasn’t him.

“Hearing that from a trickster and a clever spirit like yourself means a lot. So, thank you” she responded with a grin as she took a step forward. And then she broke the smile away and continued with aggression. “But not thank you for possessing Stiles and tricking my friends into thinking them you’re Stiles, and…” She looked at the sword in Scott’s stomach. “Sword in my friend is also something I can’t thank you for.” She drew her eyebrows together, looking at the Nogitsune. “Did you steal those from the Oni?”

The void Stiles looked at her with a sick grin, and then the sword she was carrying and then back to her face. “Ah, so you knew” he announced, leaving Scott to be. The sword in his stomach was going to keep him from healing for a while and since he was still breathing heavily and his heart pounding, he was nothing to be worried about.

Stella licked her lips and looked at the Nogitsune, taking her eyes from Scott. She was trying to control down her anxiety, but it was getting too hard on her side. She had no idea what to do here. Probably stalling till something happened or she had no choice of anything. “You told me that” she reminded with a little bit of anger hidden inside her voice. “My dream in the hospital. I remember, you know.” She forced herself to keep talking. “Besides, Stiles wouldn’t have the need to forcefully break into my house and frame murder on my uncle and Derek, making them looking like guilty when there was a bomb at the station that they were taken to. Stiles wouldn’t do that _knowing_ that there was a bomb in there.” She winked at the Nogitsune. “The emitters kinda gave it away. Be a lot more careful next time. Of course, if there is a next time.”

Nogitsune amusingly laughed. “I’d really rather my vessel to be you” he said, making Stella to sarcastically scoff in disbelief as she kept her gaze on him with hatred. “But Stiles… He is pretty useful too if I’m being honest. He knows almost everything about almost everyone.” He grinned, continued. “Every one of your weaknesses are…” He pointed his brain. “… just one thought away.” Stiles laughed. “Did you know how they are still not telling the truth about how your mother actually died? Because I do.” He grinned. Stella tightened the muscles on her body with hate. “And this one right here… Oh yeah, he fells super guilty about it.”

In that moment all of Stella’s hard feelings and anger towards everyone came back and, for a moment, she felt like that 16-year-old girl who just came back to Beacon Hills and learned how her mother died from Derek Hale. But then she realized it was what the Nogitsune wanted. She knew she had to push it all away. She was angry and bitter but she reminded herself that they were in a war with a trickster fox spirit and just because she was angry at them, she wasn’t going to lose them.

“Yeah, I know” Stella shrugged like it wasn’t a big deal. She felt Scott’s sad puppy brown eyes on him as he was feeling guilty. He was still on the ground with a sword in his stomach but was able to hear the conversation. Stella felt his gaze but she didn’t break down. She kept talking with the Nogitsune. “Peter slashed her throat open in front of Allison. Really bloody, really sad way to go.” She sighed. “Oh, well… But you know, it’s not important how she died. What’s important is that she died. She is dead. Right now. So, this is not going to break me or have mercy on you for telling me this fun fact that I already knew for about a year now.”

She held on tight to the sword and Stiles raised his eyebrows, seeing that. He looked at the young girl with amusement in his playful eyes. “Don’t be stupid, Stella” he teased, enjoying this situation. “We all know you’re not going to kill your best friend.” He chuckled but then someone came behind him. As he felt something, a horrifying pain on his shoulder, he turned around to see Deaton injecting something inside his body. He started grunting, groaning, and breathing hard while Stella gasped and took a step back.

“But we can poison the fox inside him” Deaton responded, watching Stiles’ body to fall to the ground. Stella sighed in relief, looked at Deaton with a thank you and then ran to Scott to help him out. He was breathing heavily. Stella helped him with the sword still inside his stomach, making him groan and scream in pain as she pulled it out.

Scott turned his head to look at Deaton after Stella helped him get up on his feet. “What was that?” he questioned, still breathing heavily. “Was that a cure? Is he okay?”

“The fox is poisoned” Deaton answered the young Alpha. He looked at him and Stella before continuing. “But it’s not dead. Not yet.”


	20. ECHO HOUSE

Stella sighed, looking at the open text message on her phone one more time since it’s been sent to her phone few hours ago. She read the text. Stiles was informing her about how he was checking himself into Eichen House to get himself away from them, away from everyone so that he wouldn’t hurt anyone ever again until they found something to heal him, to get rid of the Nogitsune. Stella was the only person Stiles texted and Stella knew she wasn’t supposed to tell Scott but, knowing what Eichen House meant, she found herself calling Scott so that he would at least try to talk him out of it since Eichen House was a nuthouse who once had Barrow in and now Malia was in there due to trauma in the woods and because well… Her father pushed her to be there.

And Stella hated that place.

Stella sighed, throwing her phone onto her bed in frustration. They still had no idea how to save Stiles from that sick fox spirit and according to Stiles, if they can’t find a way to save him, they have to make sure that he will stay locked up in a nuthouse.

Stella tried to divert her mind, so she thought about Malia instead. If she kept thinking about Stiles, she was going to lose her mind and if she were to lose her mind, she wouldn’t be able to help Stiles out and then she would be stuck in this vicious circle.

The young Argent sighed as she thought about the girl they saved in the woods. Malia... The girl they saved from being a coyote… She visited her at her house once or twice a week after that. She tried to get her to adjust to the real world but then her father called it traumatizing after she lived in the woods alone all that year and locked her up in the Eichen. He meant well. He wanted his daughter to be okay, but he had no idea that all Malia needed was Humanity 101.

“Stella?” She startled, hearing cousin’s voice all of a sudden. Allison stuck her head out from the partly opened door, looked at her cousin. After Scott telling her the way Stella found out about the truth and the fact that she already knew the truth, Allison felt the need to see her. “Can we talk?”

Allison felt guilty. She felt like she betrayed her cousin. But she was certain that she’d do it again if the chance and the only reason for it when they didn’t tell her about her mom even though they told her about the whole supernatural world was to not give the nightmares Allison was having. She wanted her to be okay and when Stella didn’t ask her about Kate, she didn’t push it but now… She’s promised she wouldn’t lie to her and she couldn’t keep that promise. And she had to break that promise again because she couldn’t tell her about Derek being her father and Peter being her great uncle yet.

She had to talk to her father about it first.

Stella felt the anger again and this time, she didn’t wanna push it. She turned around, looked at her cousin. The expression on her face was full of betrayal, hurt, sadness and anger. “You know…” She was angry because they kept this one important thing from ever after everything they’ve been through. Even when they told her how Victoria died, they haven’t told her about Kate, her mother. And she was sad because Allison was the one who lied to her. “I couldn’t be careless that Chris, or Scott, or Stiles wasn’t the one who told me, who lied to me. I expected _you_ …” She emphasized on ‘you’ while talking. “… to tell me, but you didn’t.” She gulped, trying to get rid of the lump, the anger. She was tired. It’s been a long week and this day wasn’t different. She needed it to be over already. “Why?” she questioned, hurt. Stella knew she was drifting away from her cousin, from her whole family but something like this was important and she wouldn’t hesitate to tell her. No matter what. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Allison couldn’t answer for a while but then parted her lips. “Stella-” she started but Stella could feel her anger rising from the deepest darkest part of her brain, reaching out to surface and she wasn’t even trying to calm down. Yes, she had her priorities like saving Stiles, but she also needed this one to get out of her chest.

She’s been holding onto that anger for a while now.

“No, Allison” she interrupted her. She was so angry yet, her voice was breaking. “We were like sisters. We’d tell each other everything and by everything, I mean things like how my mom actually died included.” They needed to get to the vet to meet with Scott and Deaton to talk and think of a plan to save Stiles but for that moment, Stella didn’t care. She let the fresh air fly to her lungs and then gave out the breath from her nose. She dropped her shoulders. “You know who told me? Derek! The guy who lost his family because of my mother. The guy who has every right to hate me. The guy who I had no idea why he trusted me enough to tell me but honestly, I wouldn’t rather hear it from him, the story of my mother getting her throat slashed…” She paused for a second and then continued. “That’s kind of story I’d rather hear from you.”

Allison took a deep breath, she understood Stella. She would be angry too, but she was also right in her own way. She knew her cousin’s past with parasomnia and insomnia at the same time. She was still having nightmares time to time because she witnessed Kate’s death. Stella didn’t have to go through that. But Allison knew she wasn’t gonna be able to reason with her right now. “Stella, I’m sorry” was the only thing she could say.

“You’re sorry?!” Stella couldn’t help her volume and since Chris wasn’t there to stop the argument, she didn’t know if she could stop either. She frustratedly scoffed, continued while Allison thought about the last time that she saw her cousin like this. She was arguing with Kate, she was angry, frustrated, and brutal. Allison understood her. Stella hated when people lied to her. “You are the one who always lies to me Allison! You lied to me about this supernatural world, how my mother died… All this time, I spent my time trying to get myself to believe that she died in a car crash because this was the only information I got. I asked Derek what really happened with the hopes of that _you_ …” She emphasized on the word ‘you’ again and continued. “… didn’t lie to me. But of course, you kept lying to me.” She took a deep breath. “I hope the lying stops after this Ally because I love you. I really do. And you are the only one I told this to. Don’t let this go to waste.”

“I had my reasons” she said, stood tall in front of her cousin, still standing near the door. Their brown eyes locked, and Allison continued. “And I meant to tell you. I really did. I just… I didn’t want to make things worse and then you started avoiding me. You were running away from me and I didn’t want to make things worse.” Stella took a deep breath, opened her mouth to disagree with her but Allison interrupted her without even giving her time to say something otherwise. “Don’t you say that is not true, Ella. I know you. I remember the times you and I would kill to see each other. I remember the times we lived in Washington together. I remember. Now all you do is ignore me and just run away from me…” Stella had to pause as she noticed something. Allison was hurt just like she was. Stella felt the guilt rising inside her, pushing down the anger even though it was still there. Allison sighed. “Look, can we talk about this later? We plan another Argent Girls day. We can talk. But right now, we have to get to the vet to meet with Scott.”

Argent Girls Day was something that they came up with when they were little, watching Gilmore Girls. They would turn off their phones or keep it in silence, and act like there were just the two of them in the world. They would talk about what’s happening in their lives, just be there for one and another. Sometimes, just for the fun of it, they would drop water balloons on the people that were walking past their loft. They used to watch the Gilmore Girls which was the show that inspired that day, but after finishing that show twice, they just used that day to talk and listen to their thoughts. It was their way to get away from real world, their pain.

Stella looked at her cousin. She didn’t feel ready to do another Argent Girls day, but she thought, enough with the running. She had to talk it through with her. “Alright” she nodded, agreeing with her. “Okay. But right now, we should be focusing on finding Stilinski.”

“Did you have any trouble with Ikeda?” Chris asked them over the phone. Stella, Allison, Scott, and Deaton were at the vet clinic, Chris was using his phone call and they were trying to find out what the hell they were gonna do now. The phone was put on speaker and on the desk so that everyone could hear him.

“Only minor” Deaton answered. He was talking about the time he went to some Chinese Yakuza’s house to get the poison that effected the Nogitsune. Meanwhile, Stella was trying so hard not to look at Allison from the corner of her eyes. Things were rocky between them, but they had to push it away and talk it through later and being like that with her, even with her recent actions… It was driving her crazy. She was still her best friend, sister. “The white wolf was exactly where you said it would be. But we have two problems now.” Deaton connected his hands and rested them on the desk in front of him. His eyes moved up from the phone to Allison, Scott and Stella who were also looking between the phone and the doc. “First, the lichen is not a cure. It’ll wear off in a matter of days.”

“But while it does work, the oni won’t go after Stiles, right?” Chris asked curiously, frowning. With that question, Stella’s eyes moved up from the phone to Deaton’s face. She was wondering the answer to that as well.

“I hope” Deaton responded, not being sure of the answer since it was all their first time fighting with a dark kitsune. “Eichen House has an unusual history. It might not be all that safe for the Oni there as well.”

“What’s the second problem?” Chris asked.

“I checked with your contacts in Japan” Deaton continued, answering. “The Yakuza Boss you saw killed by the Oni never found a scroll.”

Allison frowned, looked at Deaton. “What scroll?” she wondered.

“A Shugendo scroll” Deaton answered the young girl. “The Shugendo were the ascetic mystics of Japan.”

“The scroll had information on how to exorcise a Nogitsune” Chris explained, his hands were still handcuffed and normally him and Derek were holding inside a cell.

Stella sighed; Scott parted his lips. “So, we need to find that scroll?” he said, trying to be sure of the conversation and the plan that was happening right now. 

Deaton nodded. “Exactly” he said. “And I did get a name of the man who last purchased it.” He looked at the teenagers around him. “Kincaid.”

Allison frowned, remembered who he was. “He was with Katashi” she said, looked at the doctor. “He’s the guy who met with Isaac to buy the gun.”

Stella moved her eyebrows up and down, looked at Deaton. Her arms were crossed in front of her and rested against the desk, leaning into it. “Sounds like Katashi wanted the scroll for himself” she said underneath her breath.

“But Stilinski already told me nothing like it was found among his things” Chris said, trying to think about where it could be. And when Stella heard what he said, she started to think. “And a paranoid like Katashi would keep it close. Probably on him at all times.”

Stella frowned, looked down at her hands. “What does a Shugendo Scroll look like?” she asked, her eyes moved up to Deaton who turned the chair he was sitting on after Stella’s question and turned back with an old looking rolled up piece of paper. Stella grabbed the scroll from his hands and looked it very carefully. She thought about the time she was doing some research in France and the day she met Katashi by accident and that horrible of a conversation. She thought about his silver finger. “Do these come in different sizes?”

“Any size” Deaton answered, wondering where she was going with this while Allison and Scott were also looking at Stella, very confused.

Stella softly nodded, looked at Deaton. “Then I think I know where it might be.”

“Most of the people here are okay” Oliver said, not coughing this time due to swallowing a bug the other day. Oliver was Stiles’ roommate in Eichen, and he was pretty weird, and he also probably had a bug in his stomach which was disgusting to Stiles. He didn’t even know why he knew that. And now, he was showing him around as they were making their way to the phone booth. “The violent ones are in the closed unit.” He pointed at someone as they passed her by. “That’s Hillary. She has OCD.” He pointed someone else. “That’s Gary. He thinks he’s Jesus Christ.” He pointed someone else. “Dan. Also Jesus.” He pointed a black girl who was sitting on the bench. “That’s Mary…”

“Mary Magdalene?” Stiles took a guess teasingly.

“No, she also thinks she’s Jesus” Oliver responded as he kept walking. Stiles nodded, feeling the anxiety rising inside him as he remembered the suicide the other night, in his first night. He had to call someone but when they saw someone else, a girl was using the phone, they stopped on their spot waiting for Stiles’ turn to come. “You’d be surprised how man Jesuses we get.”

“Not really” Stiles commented, looking around.

“Hey, how come you want to use the phone already?” Oliver wondered, looking at his roommate.

“Because after one night, I’ve thought Stella and Scott were right and I’ve changed my mind about this place being safe for me” he answered, turned his head to look at Oliver. And then he started looking around, moving on his spot nervously. “Or anyone. Ever.”

“No, no. I think you’re wrong” the girl on the phone said, making Stiles look at her with a frown. She had short hair, very short hair and she was wearing grey sweatpants like everybody else and she definitely looked like she was crazy. But as he decided not to give much thought into it, the girl kept talking. “I really think I should tell them. They’re going to want to know the story. The whole story. I really think they should know.” Stiles shook his head to both sides, kept looking around, waiting for her to finish her call. “Yes, I do. One of them is standing right behind me.”

Stiles quickly turned to look at her, frowned even more with confusion. The girl hung up the phone, walked away with fast steps while Stiles followed her with his eyes. “Who was that?” he asked, walking to the telephone.

“That’s Meredith” Oliver answered Stiles, walking near him. “She’s a little weird.”

“You’re a little weird” Stiles corrected him, confused about Meredith. “She’s a lot weird.” He grabbed the phone, took it to his ear. Dialed the digits but there was nothing. He heard nothing. “It’s dead” he stated, looking at Oliver who nodded him yes.

“Yeah” he said. “They turn off all the phones for 24 hours after suicide.”

Stiles stopped looking at the direction Meredith walked away. His hazel eyes found Oliver. “Why didn’t you tell me that before?” he asked curiously and a little bit frustrated.

“Why didn’t you ask?” Stiles rolled his eyes, put the phone back in and started walking away with Oliver behind, following him. “What are you going to do now?”

“I’m getting out of this nuthouse” Stiles answered, keep on walking.

Oliver grimaced at the term. “That’s not really appropriate way to describe a facility like this” he said, walking after Stiles while playing with his hands.

And then all of a sudden Stiles stopped, seeing someone that got his attention. He frowned, looked at the girl. “Malia?” he guessed, not being sure. When he first got here, he felt like he saw her, but he wasn’t sure but now she was there, turning around to look at the person who called her name, only to see one of the people who saved her. And to be honest, she wasn’t very fond of them, except for the brunette who kept visiting her. While Malia frowned and looked at Stiles, he kept talking with a smile that he thought it was comforting. “Hey. It’s Stiles. Do you remember me? I’m friends with Scott.” He stopped and took a breath. “Remember? We were the ones who helped you out with-”

Malia shut him with a punch in the face, causing him to fall to the ground grunting. As he was grimacing and trying to breath due to pain, the staff came running. “Malia!” one of the men shouted, telling her to stop. “A few more like this, Malia, and you’re headed to the closed unit.”

They grabbed her by the arms, keeping her still but Malia was trying to free herself. “No!” She screamed as few of the other staff grabbed Stiles.

“Hey, what the hell!?” he shouted. “She hit me!” Man pushed Stiles’ face to the ground, keeping him still. “Okay, wait, wait, wait!” he shouted, trying to stop the on-duty from pushing his hair further. It was almost painful. “I didn’t do anything! Stop!” And then his eyes looked through the holes to the basement. The familiarity scared the hell out of him because he knew where this was. It was the place he was during that scary dream, when he sleepwalked to the coyote den. He could still feel the smell in his nose, and the pain on his leg.

“Enough!” Some woman’s voice echoed, reaching Stiles. She had long straight hair that was reaching out to her stomach. She was black and Stiles knew who she was. she cut the crowd, making her way to Stiles. “Enough!” She was looking at the man who was holding Stiles but not too long after, she looked down at Stiles who was locked on the basement with fear in his eyes. She kneeled in front of the young man. “Stiles.” He looked up to Morell, surprised to see her here but he was focused on the basement. He was breathing heavily. “You saw something, didn’t you?” she asked calmly.

“That basement” Stiles answered after gulping down. “I’ve been down there before.”

“Still nothing?” Chris asked, turning his head but still not being able to see Derek who was sitting down in the next cell to his in the police station. “Derek?” he repeated when there was no response.

But in that time, Derek’s eyes were closed as he was trying to focus on the hearing. “Hold on” he murmured, shutting him up for a while. And then he heard the conversations. One of the deputies asked Parrish where the sheriff is.

“Stilinski’s out for the day” Parrish answered, clarifying the situation for the fellow deputy. “So, the Katashi Murder is now a Federal Investigation. Everything here that wasn’t blown up needs to be placed in lockup.”

When the conversation he was supposed to listen ended, he opened his eyes back on and sighed. “You were right” he said and rested his head against the wall that was between his cell and Argent’s. “They’re moving all the evidence.”

“Was there anything about the murder itself?” Chris asked curiously. Because of the wall between them, he couldn’t see him, but he turned his head and looked out his cell anyway. “Any other details?”

“Just about putting Katashi’s thing in a Federal Lockup and something about Stilinski being out for the day” Derek repeated what he has heard and quickly continued. “You know, if all of this is true, people are dead because of Stiles.”

“But is it really Stiles?” Chris questioned. He took a deep breath and continued. “Remember, we’ve had this problem before.”

“But we got lucky with Jackson” Derek reminded him. There were people coming and going so meanwhile, they hit pause on their conversation, stayed in silent. When the last deputy went back to his work, Derek continued talking with a question. “What happens when you don’t get lucky?”

“I guess it depends on how much or how little of Stiles is left” he answered this question and then, he looked down, continued. “You ever heard of the Berserkers?”

“Germanic warriors” Derek said, pretty much answering his question yes. “They wore the skins of bears to channel their ferocity.”

“They didn’t just wear them, they became them” Chris started explaining. He was thinking. “You know, a couple of years ago, a family came to us for help with their son. This group of teenagers, they were doing all sorts of rituals with animal skins.” He breathed in. “Somehow they tapped into it. But with Berserkers, the human side doesn’t last long. They’re not tempered by the moon.”

“He killed people?” Derek asked, frowned.

“He tore them apart.” He paused for a split second, took a breath in. “Eventually, I had to tell the family their son was gone. It took three of us to take him down. Almost every bullet we had. And when it was over…” He softly shook his head, sighed. “I felt no remorse. None.” Derek was silent, listening the Argent talk. “I knew that kid was long gone.”

“Would you feel any remorse putting Stiles down?” Derek asked, lightly raising his eyebrows.

“Stiles? Yes,” Argent said, feeling disturbed even with the thought but then he frowned. He continued. “But not a Nogitsune.”

Derek softly nodded, took a deep breath and looked down at his hands, thinking. “I know at least one person who wouldn’t want you to do that” he responded at what Chris told him, trying to get the conversation to another. Argent whispered a confirmation but didn’t say anything else. Derek took another breath in and turned his head to Argent’s cell. “So…” he said, causing an awkward silence that he later broke. “You knew, ha?”

Chris knew what he was talking about, he parted his lips. They had to talk about it eventually and there was no better time than that, apparently. “I am one of the very few people who knows about this, Derek” Chris answered the werewolf. “Aside from Kate, only me, Gerard and my mother Maéva knew about this.” He slightly turned his head. “I have no idea how you found out though.”

“I found a way to talk to my mother” Derek answered him. “She told me, couple of weeks ago. I was just trying to wrap my head around it.” Chris shook his head, knowing it was understandable. “Do you know if… Do you know if she…? If Stella knows?” he asked, breaking the silence. He knew Stella was incredibly smart but still, he couldn’t be sure if she knew or not.

Chris stopped to think about it and realized he didn’t have the answer to that. “I don’t know” he answered. “But I think… If she knew, she’d either already have this conversation with you or God knows, she’d be screaming at me.” He shook his head with the thought. “She hates it when people lie to her and she has every right to.”

Derek raised his eyebrows, parted his lips. “And you’re still keeping that from her?” he asked, surprised. He scoffed and slightly shook his head. “Well, you also kept the truth about her mother’s death away from her as well.” He turned around and looked ahead, dropping his shoulders. “Sorry, I told her.”

“She knows?” Chris questioned with the new information. “Since when?”

Derek sighed. “She came to see me when she first came to town last year. She asked me and I didn’t like to her” he explained and then turned his head towards Argent who looked down at his hands with guilt. “Why did you lie to her?”

Chris felt the anger, but he tried to calm him down. After all, after everything, he was still her father. “That was Allison’s decision and she had every right to, Derek. Stella’s been suffering from parasomnia ever since she was a little kid and she thought keeping that as a secret would help her.” He sighed. “Look, Derek, I don’t know if you truly know her or how much you know her…” Chris paused, thought about what he was gonna say. “… But before she moved to New York to live with Gerard and Maéva, there was a time that I looked after her in Washington. I raised her. Finding about her father is a werewolf is not something she can sink in easily. She still has problems with her being a banshee or whatever. She’s going through some rough time and me telling her that her father is a werewolf is not going to help her. Believe me. She is better off not knowing.”

“Okay, but is she…?” Derek started to ask but before even he could finish his sentence, Chris interrupted him.

“We don’t know and we’re not talking about it” he said quickly. “But if she was, we’d have seen something by now.”

When the doorbell rang, Stella and Allison were in a room where they were keeping most of the weapons, filling up the guns, checking the armory. Lydia was in Chris’ study, waiting them after Stella told them about the whole plan that she was thinking of to get the scroll. “Do we really need the twins?” Allison asked, looking at her cousin curiously.

Stella checked the safety on the gun, walked around the table and looked at her cousin who she knew wasn’t a big fan of the twins. As she made her way to the front door to let them in, she parted her lips. “I know you don’t like them, Ally” Stella started. She walked around the table and walked her way out of the room. She still didn’t know, couldn’t feel how were things between them but right now, this was possibly the least of her worries. “But Chris and Derek are in jail and we need every help we can get.” Stella quickly pulled the door to herself, opening it and then looked at the werewolves for a second before she made her way into Chris’ study where Lydia was waiting for them. “Derek said all of the Katashi evidence is being moved to a Federal Lockup by armored car tonight.” Scott frowned, following the Argents with twins by his side, walking down the Argent’s hallway. “Probably within the next few hours.” They walked up to Lydia who was standing near the door. Stella and Allison stood right next to her, looked at the werewolves who were standing few feet in front of them with confused faces.

First one to understand Stella’s plan was Aiden. “We’re going to rob an armored car?” he asked, his voice got high, he was definitely shocked. As all of them, put two and two together, their mouths opened widely in shock, looking at the three girls standing in front of the study room.

“Well” Lydia said, smiling. She reacted the same way when she heard Stella’s plan for the first time but after a while, she knew it was their only option. “We’re going to try.

Stella started to smirk, looking at Aiden and the others. “It’s gonna be a piece of cake.”

“It’s a really bad plan” Scott announced after the girls explained them the whole plan. It was obvious, it wasn’t their best but there was also no other way.

“It’s not that bad” Lydia argued as she was sitting on one of the chairs and leaning on her elbows on her legs, while Stella and Allison were standing near the table.

“It’s not that good” Aiden argued back, standing right next to Stella who let out a breath between her lips as if she was enough with this. She rolled her eyes, crossed her arms in front of her chest while Lydia kept explaining them the main idea of the plan.

The rest was on Stella.

“None of us knows the route they’re going to take” Lydia said, after hearing Aiden’s argument. She stood up, walked over to Stella, and put her hands on the desk, leaning forward. She looked Ethan, Scott and Aiden who was just hearing what they were going to try to do. “If Allison or Stella can get one of the Argent’s GPS trackers on the armored car then we can follow it.”

Stella pointed a part on the map that was laid on the table. She was pointing the bridge. “So, when it gets here-”

“We attack them?” Ethan guessed interrupting Stella’s sentence, causing her to look at the twin who was sitting down.

She pressed her lips, shook her head. “No” she said. “Your bikes will be in the middle of the road, looking like you guys got into an accident. And when the driver gets out to help-”

“We attack him?” Ethan completed.

“NO!” the girls screamed all together, looking at him.

“You’ll distract him” Lydia corrected him. “And Scott will break open the back door while Stella shows her criminal skills as she gets Katashi’s finger.”

When they all turned to look at Scott, young Alpha moved on his sport nervously, not feeling sure himself. “I hope” he murmured, causing Stella to grimace and smile at the same time with a sigh.

Lydia looked at Aiden and continued. “And you’ll be Stella’s backup as she gets the finger and protect her” she said with a smile.

Aiden’s unsure dark eyes moved from Stella to Lydia, Lydia to Allison. He frowned. “Whose plan was this?” he asked curiously.

As the girls’ gazes found Stella, blaming her, all she did was shrug. “What?” she said, like it wasn’t a big deal. She was making fun of it even though she was pretty nervous. “I couldn’t miss the opportunity to plan my biggest robbery.”

Aiden didn’t even find in himself to make a comment about that but there was something else bothering him. “It’s not his actual finger, is it?” he curiously questioned, and he wasn’t alone on this either.

As Scott looked at the girls, waiting for the answer, Stella rolled her eyes; Lydia opened her eyes in disbelief, couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “You are so out of our league” she commented, making Aiden to drop his arms, and looked at her offended. It was just a question after all.

But then his dark eyes moved to Stella, letting go the off the question. “Why aren’t we just going to Stilinski for help?” Aiden wondered, asking as he knew Stella planned the whole thing and she was the mastermind of the plan.

Stella straightened up, looked at Aiden. “Because if he gets caught, then it’s the Sheriff tampering with federal evidence” she answered. “Besides, he is in Los Angeles right now, trying to find something that will help Stiles and already in enough trouble thanks to Scott’s dad.” Young Alpha softly nodded, knowing the truth that he hated. “We can’t ask this from him.”

Allison took a deep breath, seeing the expression on their faces. She knew it was a long shot, but she trusted her cousin on this, and she knew they could do it. They had to. “Guys, this is going to work” she said with a confident voice. “We can do this.”

“We have to do this” Stella corrected Allison. She crossed her arms in front of her chest, leaned into the desk behind her. Her mind was full of thoughts, but she was in the present. She looked at her friends. “We’re losing Stiles. Chris and Derek are in jail for murder.” She shook her head, bit her lip softly. “We need to do this.” As she tried to ease her mind, she shrugged, sighed, and moved her eyebrows up and down. “It should be easy as breaking and entry, right?”

Scott frowned in shock and looked at the girl standing right in front of him. “What are you doing here?” he curiously questioned while Kira quickly walked in and looked at Scott. She looked excited and nervous at the same time.

“I want to help” she said, walked inside the house. Scott closed the door behind him, put his helmet on the table and looked at Kira. He had doubts of letting her help them for two reasons. One, he didn’t want Kira to get hurt, and two, he didn’t think that Stella was going to enjoy that.

For some reason, Stella never liked Kira. Like, at all.

“I’m not sure it’s such a good idea” he responded looking at the girl who was playing with her fingers nervously.

“Is it because of Stella?” she wondered, looked at Scott who frowned asking why and waited Kira to explain. She took a deep breath. “I know she doesn’t like me very much but… I really want to help.”

Scott kept looking at Kira as he shook his head no. “Look, I don’t know why Stella acts the way she acts but it’s not because of her” Scott responded and add ‘mainly’ in his mind.

Kira nodded, but then quickly continued. “Is it because of my mother?” she asked, still playing with her hands. 

“No, I know that’s not your fault” Scott said this time, spreading his hands to both sides.

“Yeah, but it still feels like it is” Kira reacted. “And if I can help, shouldn’t I?”

“People who help us usually end up getting her” Scott told her as he was trying to warn her, trying to keep her safe. “Badly.”

Kira nodded again, took a nervous deep breath, and parted her lips. “Okay, but I’ve been practicing” she said, reaching up to her bag.

Scott frowned. “Practicing what?”

“I’ve been picking this up really fast” Kira explained. “Like crazy fast.” She took out a sword from her bag and it was so fast that if Scott wasn’t a werewolf, he would probably lose his head already.

He gasped, startled, and then looked at Kira. “You sure about that?” he asked, still leaned back position that he went in while dodging the sword swing.

“Sorry” she apologized nervously and then placed in position. “Watch.” She started swinging the sword above her head with fast and sharp movements that shocked and amazed Scott. He knew he was going to regret what he was about to do, and he knew an hour and a half left for their plan and he had to talk to Stella, but he smiled as he looked at Kira.

“Okay” Scott said quickly. “You’re coming.”

“No” Stella said, not even looking at Scott at first. She couldn’t believe Scott was coming to her with this an hour before. She couldn’t believe he made this decision not even consulting Stella first or ask for her opinion when her opinion was just too obvious and she was the freaking creator of the plan.

“Stella-!”

Stella quickly interrupted Scott without even letting him form a full sentence. She looked at his brown eyes, determined and crossed her arms in front of her. “Scott, no!” she said, like there was no way in hell that she was going to change her mind. “I don’t want her in. Definitely no.”

“Why?” Scott asked, really wondering about the reason why she didn’t like Kira.

Stella looked at him in disbelief, raised her eyebrows. “Why?” she repeated a little bit louder than she intended to. “Scott, I can’t sleep because of her foxfire thing. Isaac is still in hospital because of her. Stiles is possessed because of her and if you think Eichen House is going to stop the Nogitsune then you are just way too much optimistic for your own good. And if you want me to go on with my reasons, hell, I can do it all day.” She shook her head. Scott knew her reasons were pretty valid. “I don’t want her in or anywhere near this plan.”

“She just wants to help” Scott murmured with a lot calmer and understanding voice.

Stella chuckled sarcastically. “Well, I want her to leave us alone” she argued back. “That would be pretty helpful.”

“Stella” Scott said but before he could speak, Stella shut him up again.

“Scott, I’m not going to change the plan” Stella said, determined. “I have one and I’m going to stick to it.”

“Just give her a chance, okay?”

Stella sighed, looked at Scott’s brown eyes and dropped her shoulders in defeat. She rolled her eyes, shook her head. “Alright” she said. “But if this plan goes sideways because of Kira and the changes I make because of her…” She poked Scott’s chest with her index finger with frustration and finished her sentences. “I’m blaming you.”

“Are you really gonna be able to pull this off?” Aiden questioned curiously as he looked at the young girl who was kneeling right next to him. Stella and Aiden were hiding in the higher ground, watching what was happening. Stella watched Kira run to the armored car getting out of her hiding spot with rolling her eyes.

“If the new plan works without a problem, everything goes according the plan and the little fox doesn’t screw it all up…” Stella listed some factors as she kept watching Kira. And then she looked at Aiden with a fake smile. “It’s gonna be a piece of cake for me.”

“You really don’t like this girl, do you?” Aiden asked with a soft grin as he was looking at Stella directly who had her hair in a ponytail so that fighting was gonna be a lot easier.

Stella shrugged, checking if the gun was loaded and checking the safety and then looked back at the car again. “I’m a criminal” Stella responded to Aiden, not looking at him. “I’ve made changes in a plan that would probably go without a hiccup just for one girl and I want everything go as I planned.” She rolled her eyes. “Obviously.”

And that was when everything started to go as unplanned. Kira was able to put the GPS on the armored car but then Parrish got out and in Stella’s term, Little Fox was trapped near the armored vehicle.

And when Parrish looked inside the car and took out his gun, the plan was just out of the window.

“So, are you gonna be able to pull it off now?” Aiden asked, worriedly putting one of his hands-on Stella’s arm. She gulped, seeing the back doors opened widely and some giant werewolf hopped off and hurt Parrish. She pressed her lips together and closed her eyes shut, asking for patience and help.

“I think that’s our friend Kincaid” Stella murmured, opening her eyes back. She reached out to her gun suddenly which caused Aiden to take a step back with reflex making Stella giggle softly even in the situation they were right now. “Relax, Aiden” she said smiling. “If I was planning on using them on you, I would’ve done it already.”

After saying that, she left Aiden alone on the lookout and made her way to the car to clean Kira’s mess and fix what was left from the plan.

“You want to talk about the code?” Chris asked, moving his hands as much as the cuffs were allowing him to the and looking at Araya Calavera who was one of the greatest hunter families. She announced herself as Chris’ lawyer, but the truth was that she was only there to talk to Chris about his family and the hunter code.

“Ours is more than a code of behavior” Araya said with her Spanish accent and broken English looking at the Argent who was in chains and sitting behind the metal table. “It’s a code of honor.” She tilted her head and continued. “These things bind our families. You don’t abandon such things lightly.”

“Where in the code does it say my wife had to kill herself?” Chris asked this time, angrily. It was still hurting that Victoria had to kill herself, die in Chris’ arms just because she was bitten and becoming a werewolf. It was still a dagger to his heart… the moment Allison found out about her mother’s death. That dagger was still there, hurting him. He could still hear her sobbing, crying ringing through his ears.

“Your wife honored us with her dying breath” Araya said firmly.

“She could have honored her daughter by living” Chris fought, making Araya grimace and get herself ready to speak again.

She parted her lips. “Your family is very complicated, though” Araya observed. “Isn’t it?”

In that moment, Chris thought about the reason why Araya was here. Why was she here? He thought about the conversation he had with Derek few minutes ago and looked at Araya, scowled. “What do you really want to know?” he asked firmly. “Is this about Stella?” He paused to take a breath and continued. “What are you fishing for?”

Araya laughed sarcastically, stood up from her chair and looked at Chris. “I don’t fish, _mijo_ ” she said with a grin. “I hunt.”

“Hello big guy” Stella chimed, getting Kincaid’s attention on herself. She smiled. “Actually, we need that finger.” The big werewolf looked at the Silverfinger he was holding and then looked at the young girl, added a mocking grin on his face asking why. That’s when Stella felt Scott walk to her and Allison with her crossbow. Stella held her gun more visible to Kincaid, looked at him with a smile and moved one of her eyebrows.

“Why should I give it to you?” big guy asked again with a thick voice. He was smiling at them, relaxed, still holding the finger.

“There’s a briefcase in there with $150,000 in it” Allison responded, still aiming the big guy with a crossbow.

“The scroll inside the prosthetic finger is worth three million” Kincaid said, pulling the finger up in the air, showing it to the teenagers. Then he put the finger in his pocket, while Stella softly nodded and moved her tongue on her lips, frustrated already.

She looked up the him. The scene probably looked very funny considering a big werewolf against a tiny human, but Stella was also a hunter and she had a plan. “Give me the finger” she said, tough and determined but then she realized how it sounded like and blinked. She parted her lips one more time. “You know what I mean.”

Then someone jumped off from the car, directly at the werewolf. It was Kira. Stella rolled her eyes angrily as she remembered it wasn’t part of her plan and that was just Kira’s improvising. She sighed ad she watched Kira’s jump-attack didn’t affect the werewolf even one bit.

Kira fell to the ground, Stella kept looking at werewolf as his eyes turned into a glowing blue and got in position to fight. Stella quickly pulled up her gun while he cracked joints of his throat. “I guess negotiations are over” he said and then growled.

Stella find herself smiling with joy. “Oh, this is gonna be fun” she said back, couldn’t admit but enjoying the situation a little bit. 

Allison shot one of her arrows right at him with a straight face, causing Kincaid to look at her while taking out the arrow. It didn’t affect him as well.

Kira attacked again, she failed again.

And then he hit Allison with the back of his hand which was one of his greatest mistakes because when Allison fell to the ground feeling the pain on her cheek… Well, Stella could swear instead of blood, anger and frustration was running through her veins now. Kincaid looked at the young girl like he felt that. He thought she was gonna be easy as the rest of them, but Stella dodged his attack and shot few bullets at him. The wolfsbane bullets slowed him down but didn’t affect more than that. 

And then with a sudden strength coming at Stella without she could even see it, she found herself on the ground with an excruciating pain on and inside her skull.

Seeing it, Scott attacked Kincaid, but it was for nothing. This werewolf was stronger than them, faster than them. Kincaid looked down at Scott. “You have the eyes of an Alpha” he said, underestimating him and his ‘pack’ in general. Stella tried to get up, holding her head and grimacing with the pain. She saw Allison and Lydia few steps away from them, on the ground. “But where’s the strength?”

That’s when Stella heard Aiden’s voice, holding herself up on her palm. “Up here” he said, facing the Kincaid with Ethan side by side. As they growled and glowed their eyes blue, Stella finally stood up and saw Lydia helping out Allison.

While the twins were fighting with Kincaid, Stella walked up to Lydia and Allison. Lydia was blenching with every punch and every hit and Stella was blinking, trying to get to herself and calm down. She hit her head pretty hard but still, she felt fine.

She sighed as she saw Aiden got hit but Ethan punched Kincaid with a growl.

When the twins threw Kincaid on the ground, finally coming through the fight with a win, Stella put the gun back to her belt and walked up to the twins to help Scott, leaving Lydia and Allison alone. But Scott was faster than her this time.

“Stop!” Scott shouted, still on the ground with blood on his eyebrow and near his lips. “Aiden. Ethan. Stop!”

The twins didn’t listen to him as they kept hitting Kincaid but then Stella walked up to them and she shouted. “Stop!” her voice was louder than Scott and was the thing that stopped Aiden and Ethan, even though they were still looking pretty furious.

Ethan looked at Scott and Stella. “You want him to come after us?” he asked, pointing the werewolf with his index finger.

“We’ve seen guys like this, Stels” Aiden said, backing his brother up. His brown eyes moved from Stella to Scott and continued. “Scott, trust us. He’s dangerous.”

“So are we” Scott said, standing up and looking at Aiden and Ethan. His wound was all healed up and looking better, tough and determined. “And he looks smart enough to remember that.” He looked at everyone else, he looked at his friends. “We’re here to save a life. Not end one…”

Stella pressed her lips together, nodded at Scott, agreeing with the werewolf and then leaned into the big werewolf and put her hands into his pocket, pulling it up with the silver finger. She took out the scroll in it and put the Silverfinger back. She shrugged. “If he wants the finger so bad, he can have it” she said, tapping his pocket and smiled. She put her hand up with the scroll and sighed. “We got what we wanted.” And then chuckled, looking at the twins. “And you guys thought it was a bad plan.”

Hearing that, Aiden laughed shaking his head in disbelief while Ethan rolled his eyes but he couldn’t help the grin.

Stiles opened his eyes slowly, letting the memories coming back to his mind. He remembered Morell’s warning about how the Nogitsune was coming back the minute the marks that was the effect of the fox poison on his back were gone. He remembered his kiss with Malia, and he remembered their first time on the couch. And then he remembered vividly that when him and Malia were in the basement searching stuff that could help them with the evil spirit, Oliver came with a stun gun and a sedative and knocked them out.

And now he was trapped in a bed, tied up like Malia who was few inches away from him, still unconscious. “I borrowed a few pointers from the five-point restraint” Oliver said when he saw Stiles coming to himself. He walked around. He was tired, he had bags underneath his eyes, looking bad and purple. 

Stiles quickly looked down at his hands, pulled them to himself, trying to get himself free but nothing was happening. He was tied up and he was stuck. “Oliver, stop this” he said, grunting. All Oliver did was cough to his hands, and when he looked down at his hand, he saw the bug he swallowed the other day. He wiped away the blood on his mouth when Stiles continued speaking, begging. “Oliver, listen to me. Stop!” Oliver!” Oliver grabbed the trepanation tools with a spinning end, getting it closer to Stiles while he pulled away, trying to escape. “Oliver, stop!”

He didn’t stop but then a scary voice echoed in the basement. “Start with her.” Oliver walked away from Stiles but walked towards to Malia, like he was a puppet and his puppet master was an evil fox spirit. Stiles gasped, remembered the bug he was telling him about. It was because of it. It was because of the fly. 

Stiles looked at Nogitsune’s spirit, looking back at Stiles. “You did this” he said, scared, not knowing what to do. “You got into his head.”

“Every Dracula needs a Renfield” Nogitsune responded with his own scary accent.

Stiles looked at Oliver who was walking to Malia who was still knocked out due the sedative that Oliver injected to her body. “Just let her go” he murmured, almost begging.

Nogitsune looked at him. “Let me in” he said, grunting. Stiles pulled his hands to himself again, trying to free himself. He failed. “Stiles” the voice said, whispering. A terrible, scary whispering… “Do you want her to leave here alive?” Stiles’ hazel eyes found the Nogitsune. “Do you want us to leave? We can walk out of this place.”

“Just let her go please” Stiles begged with a shaky voice, sobbing.

Stiles tried to get himself free while Nogitsune walked towards Stiles. “Let me in” he said, grunting. Stiles screamed in frustration. “Let me in, Stiles. Let me in!”

“Just let her go, please!” Stiles screamed when he heard Oliver starting the tool and a whirring sound filled up the place. He held Malia’s head while Nogitsune repeated again, wanting him to let him back in.

Stiles shut his eyes closed, let few drops of tear fall to his chin. “Let me in Stiles! Let me in!” Stiles shook his head, scared. “Let me in and I’ll let her live. Let me in!”

Stiles’ hand loosened up. He felt exhausted, tired. He didn’t want to fight it any longer, he didn’t want anyone else to die because of him. He didn’t want anything happen to Malia. 

Oliver stopped when the tool was one or less inches away from Malia’s forehead, hearing someone calling his name. “Oliver.” He stopped the tool, looked at the source of the voice. He saw Stiles, the Nogitsune, free from the straps, rubbing his hands. He walked up to Oliver and Malia. Oliver was laughing nervously.

Stiles grabbed the tool from his hands and with a fast and sudden movement, he hit Oliver’s face with it, causing him to fall to the ground unconsciously. Stiles looked down at the tool and made his way out of the basement.

“Stiles?” Malia called out in that moment, sleepy, just coming to herself. Stiles put the tool on the table and without answering Malia, he let out a sick smirk and left her alone in the basement, still tied up to the bed. 

“There isn’t much, unfortunately” Deaton said, looking at the scroll as he was trying to read what was written in it. Stella and Scott were standing in front of the doctor after their big robbery and waiting for him to say something important to them.

“Does it say anything?” Scott asked, looking at the doctor. His arms were crossed in front of his chest and he was nervous. Stella knew that because she was in the same mood as he was.

“My Japanese isn’t great” Deaton reminded, his eyes moving between them. Stella’s expression was full of fake surprise because apparently Deaton was good at almost everything and him being not that good at Japanese was somehow funny to her. “But it appears to say that one method of expelling a Nogitsune is to change the body of the host.”

Stella frowned, looked at Scott who was as confused as she was. “Change the body?” he repeated with a question, feeling a little lost.

Deaton nodded. “Which begs the question…” His eyes were on Stella and Scott. “How do we change Stiles’ body?”

Stella looked down, moving on her spot as she was thinking and then gasped, an idea popped in her head. She looked down and then her eyes found Deaton. “By turning him into a werewolf” she murmured.


	21. THE FOX AND THE WOLF

“The blade was shattered the last time it was used” Noshiko said, telling them the whole story about the Nogitsune. She put a piece of blade on the table in front of her and looked at her daughter. Kira was still trying to understand what was happening. After they found the picture Stiles and Malia found back in the basement of Eichen House and while they were looking at it, Kira got a text from her mother telling them that her father was in danger. And she wanted them to bring something to the school. A mushroom named Reishi… Scott and Kira ran their way to the school, found about everything. That Stiles... Well, Nogitsune came to school, looking for Noshiko’s physical tails that controls the onis… And then they found out about the picture which was taken in 1943 and the girl who looked like Kira wasn’t her grandmother the way they thought she would be. It was her mother which only meant she was a lot older than she was looking.

Noshiko said she was around 900 years old and all this was really confusing to Kira. Normally… 

But they had to focus. “When was it?” Kira asked curiously, looking at her mother while trying to sink in all the information that she learnt and trying to learn more things so that they could help Stiles.

“1943” Noshiko answered. “Against a Nogitsune.”

Scott frowned, he was thinking and then with a thought, he lifted his head up to look at Kira’s parents. “All this…” He paused for a second. “It’s all happened before, hasn’t it?”

Ken Yukimura looked at his wife while Noshiko looked at Scott. Even before she answered him, Scott already knew the answer. “Yes” 900-year-old woman answered.

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it” Ken said, looking at Scott and Kira.

“Where did it come from?” Kira asked, frowned in confusion.

“It was an internment camp during World War II” Noshiko responded, starting her story. Her eyes were mostly on Kira. She was remembering everything in her mind as she was talking. “In Oak Creek. Not too far from here.”

Kira and Scott looked at each other, both of them were confused. Scott turned to look at Ken with a frown. “Hold on” he said as he remembered something that Allison told him. “You told Allison and Isaac that there was no internment camp at Oak Creek.”

“Allison’s family has a certain history of violence” Mr. Yukimura responded, looking at Scott. His hands were on the desk, leaning forward softly, giving half of his weight to his hands. “I didn’t know if she could be trusted.” Then he shook his head and continued. “There was a camp, yes. But all the records were erased.”

“They covered it up” Noshiko continued what her husband was saying.

Ken sighed, turning his body to one of his drawers attached to his desk. “When I was a grad student…” he started. “… my passion project…” He grabbed a black leather notebook from the drawer and shook his head at his choice of words. “… actually, more like an obsession…” He opened a page from the notebook as he kept talking. “… was trying to dig up the truth on Oak Creek.” He took out the black and white pictures that were inside the notebook and placed them on the table, helping them to see clearly. He looked at his wife with his eyes flickering with love. “It’s how I met your mother, Kira.”

Kira took one of the pictures to her hand, seeing a man who was laying on the bed with his face burned. And then she looked at her mother. “So, where did the Nogitsune come from?” she asked.

“Isn’t it obvious yet?” Noshiko responded with another, raising her eyebrows, and looking at her daughter. Her voice was sharp like a blade. She looked at the window, thinking about the mistakes she’s made. “It came from me.”

“This is everything non-lethal we could find” Allison said as she stepped inside the study room with Stella. On the desk, there were ropes, chains and some more harmless weapons that could help them trap Stiles.

At least long enough to find a way to help him.

Chris nodded as he walked behind them with Derek and Sheriff who was the reason that those two were out of jail now. After his time in LA, he figured he’d needed a specialist help to save his son and doctors weren’t them. Because his MRI scans were exactly as his wife’s and it wasn’t possible at all in their natural world. But in their supernatural world? He had to ask their help to stop Stiles, trap him and then save him. Because in his plan, killing wasn’t an option at all.

“Take all of it” Chris told them, looking at his daughter and then at his niece. Stella nodded, reached out to an empty bag and she started putting everything on the table to the bag.

“What’s the plan here?” Sheriff asked, his eyes moved from Stella to Chris. He was the expert here after all.

“Our best shot right now is for Derek to try to pick up Stiles’ scent at Eichen House” Chris explained it to the sheriff. “Especially if he went through something stressful there.”

“Should all five of us be going to the same place?” sheriff asked curiously, frowning as his eyes found Argent.

“Where else has Stiles been showing up?” Chris asked, straightening up.

“School, the hospital” Stella murmured as an answer. “He just keeps moving.”

“Okay, hold on. We did this already” Derek said, stopping them and causing everyone in this room to look at him. Stella frowned as her brown eyes were on him when he started speaking again. “He disappeared. We started looking for him. Then walked right into a trap at the hospital.”

Stella sighed, agreeing with the werewolf. “Same thing happened the other day” she said, she leaned into her hands that were on the table and shook her head lightly. “He’s getting us to repeat the same moves.”

“So, what do we do?” Allison asked curiously. “Wait for him to come to us?”

“We can’t” Derek answered her. “Not if the onis find him when the sun goes down.”

“Scott’s working on them right now, with Kira” Sheriff said. Stella knew from Scott’s text that Kira and he were at school, trying to get Kira’s mom to tell them about the whole story. They needed her to tell them everything.

“That’s the problem” Stella whispered, thinking. She shook her head and looked at the people around her. “We’re all trying to outfox the fox here.” There was a silence in the room. No one knew what to say or what to do because everyone knew Stella was right. And Stella thought in order to save Stiles, they had to do more than just outfoxing. They needed to come up with an amazing plan.

But she didn’t know what it was supposed to be.

Sheriff took a deep breath, breaking the silence. “Listen” he said, looked at them. “I’ll understand if anyone wants to back out.”

Hearing that, Argents looked at each other knowing it wasn’t an option and Derek straightened up, crossed his arms in front of his chest. “I’m not going to be the first wolf to run from a fox” he said firmly.

Stella found herself softly chuckling but determined to save Stiles. “Even though I’d like to see Derek running away from Stiles, literally…” She started, causing Derek to roll his eyes. His reaction entertained her but however, she was still thinking about Stiles and how to save him so when she continued speaking again, she didn’t show it. She put the flashlight inside the bag. “Running from Stiles sounds just absurd.” She looked at Sheriff and got serious. “And I’m going to save my best friend.”

“Apparently, I’m carrying the lightsaber” Chris said, referencing to Stella who’s been calling it that ever since she found out about them. Also, Parrish called it the same thing back in the police station as well.

“Dad, you and Derek hit Eichen House” Allison suggested, quickly making the plan in her mind. “Sheriff…” She looked at the Sheriff. “It’s you, me and Ella in the hospital.” Stella nodded, grabbed the bag, put it over her shoulder and as she made her way to the door, Allison looked at Chris and Derek over her shoulder. “We all meet in the school.”

The three of them were quiet as they stepped inside the elevator in the hospital. The doors slide close, none of them made a sound. Allison was looking at Stella and Sheriff time to time, but she didn’t open her mouth or say something. Everyone was thinking as the situation they were in were hard on them individually.

Allison sighed, feeling exhausted while Stella could feel her anxiety rising inside her. Her hands formed up in a fist, trying to calm herself down or at least squeeze every muscle on her body to push her anxiety down.

And in that moment, not seeing anything of what they were doing, Sheriff shook his head, looked down first and then ahead. “You know what, I don’t know how you guys do it” he said, breaking the silence. Stella frowned, her lips pressed together, taking a deep breath. She looked at the man in a sheriff uniform when he continued speaking. “You’re all so strong.” He turned his body to look at the Argent girls. Allison fixed her hair nervously; Stella pressed her lips to each other more and she thought about how he had no idea. “You’re fearless. Hell, you even manage to keep your grades up.”

“For Stella, yes” Allison answered looking at the metal doors of the hospital, thinking it was easier this way to talk. Stella sighed, thinking about her grades this year, and compared them to the last year in New York. She was a straight A student even with the whole partying and now… She wasn’t failing but she got a C and a D from one class she didn’t even know which class was it. Allison continued. “But I’m failing Econ.”

Sheriff frowned, sighed. “Is that Coach’s class?” he asked, looking at Allison who nodded to confirm while Stella gulped down, trying to get rid of the lump. Her heart was pounding for some reason and she felt so anxious to be stuck in such a small place with two other people. She normally didn’t have any problems with smaller places but apparently, she did now. She tried to breath as sheriff slowly nodded and continued. “Well, I’ll have talk with him.”

Stella meant to look at sheriff but when she saw Allison grimacing like she would do when she didn’t want to cry or was about to cry, she sighed. Things were still rocky between them, but she pushed it aside as she grabbed Allison’s hand to show her that she was there for her. She squeezed her hand, like they used to do when one of them was overwhelmed with emotions or was just too tired to deal with anything. It was their thing to show each other they weren’t alone, to give them strength. Most of the time, it worked but most of the time, it made them cry since they were already full of emotions.

Sheriff noticed that, he quickly stopped the elevator to give both of them the minute they needed so much. Because he saw their faces. Allison’s lips were pressed together, she had a frown and she was looking down. She was holding Stella’s hand so tight that both of their hands were white but then there was Stella who was in a no different mental state than her.

She was tired of being the strong one and she tried. Hell, she tried so hard to be the strong girl that she normally portrayed to be but lately… The Nogitsune in one of her best friends, the dream she saw in the hospital, the hallucinations in her daily life and more… She was just too tired and ever since she came to Beacon Hills, emotions were a concept that she just couldn’t figure out or run away from.

“Hey, you okay?” Sheriff asked, looking at them and hearing their deep and heavy breathes. Stella didn’t have the strength in her to talk but Allison? She had to talk. She had to get everything out of her chest.

“I…” she whispered, tired, exhausted, broken. Stella hoped to see that no one could see the tears in her eyes while she was looking at her cousin. She inhaled deeply. “I’m not… Fearless. I’m terrified.” She was weeping, she felt like her chest was about to explode. Allison’s right hand that wasn’t connected with Stella’s hand was in the air, trying to tell things that she couldn’t tell while she was still looking down. She continued. “I’m always terrified. I… I act like I know what I’m doing, but I don’t. I don’t know if Isaac is dying.” Stella shut her eyes with the thought of one of her best friends, imagining him in the hospital bed, not moving. “I don’t know if I made a mistake with Scott.” Stella opened her eyes, but they were red, broken and someway defeated. “I don’t know what my dad is thinking. I don’t know if we should trust Derek. I don’t know… I don’t know anything.” 

Sheriff pulled Allison into a hug when Stella let go off her hand, feeling a lot more overwhelmed than before. Hearing Allison, listening the things she was saying made her just… She had no idea. She felt like the walls were coming onto her as she walked to the corner with her hands between her hair. She sat on the corner, pulling her knees to herself and closed her eyes shut. She could hear Sheriff’s voice, calming Allison down as he was hugging her and then… She felt a tear making its way to her chin and to the floor.

Then, she heard Sheriff. “Stella?” he said, walking to Stella with Allison in the small box they were in, still stopped. Stella didn’t open her eyes as she felt movement right in front of her. She didn’t want anyone to see her teary and red eyes. She hated herself for crushing out like that.

Allison sighed, wiped away her tears as she reached out for Stella’s hand. She’s witnessed her meltdowns before, not wanting to. And it was for one time. Even with everything went down between them, Stella was still important to her. And knowing her latest meltdown was years ago, when they were around 10, made it feel sadder for her to watch Stella like this.

In the other hand, Sheriff was shocked. He remembered her from the times she was living here, he knew her and he knew her and his son were a lot closer for the last few months which gave him a reason to get to know Stella better and now as he was watching her cry, seeing her guard down… It was all new to the sheriff.

“Ella” Allison said softly, squeezing her hand with support. Her voice was still a little bit shaky and cracked but Stella was the one who was important right now. “Open your eyes.”

Stella shook her head. “No” she whispered back. She gulped down, sniffling. “No one needs to see me like this. I just… I just need a minute.”

“Stella, look at me” Sheriff murmured softly with a calming voice. Stella had no idea why, but she found herself opening her eyes slowly, showing them the red around them due to crying. She wiped away the tears, looked at them.

“I…” she sobbed, like her cousin. “I just… I don’t know what’s happening.” She inhaled deeply. She was sitting on the corner with her knees pulled up to her, her arms wrapped around them. She didn’t have the strength to get up. She looked at her cousin before she continued. “I don’t know how things are between us with you. I don’t know what’s happening to Isaac. I don’t… I don’t know anything. I don’t know if Aid…” She couldn’t even say his name. “I don’t know what I feel.” She shook her head. “I want to be the strong girl that I was before, before I ever come here but… It’s just too damn hard.”

Sheriff dropped on his knees, hugging Stella while Allison stood next to her, still holding her hand. As she squeezed Stella’s hand, Stella closed her eyes and sobbed. Let herself go for the moment. “Everything’s going to be okay” Sheriff murmured, looking at Allison and rubbing Stella’s back to calm them down, to make them feel better. Sheriff pulled away, smiled at both of them and then he got up, helped Stella to get up. He chuckled softly, looking at them both. “You know what’s funny? You both sound just like a cop.” Stella and Allison found themselves chuckling even with her puffy and red eyes. “Hey, you guys are gonna be okay.”

Sheriff looked at them one more time, made sure they were feeling a lot better and then hit the button to make the elevator move again, while Stella and Allison wiped away their tears. And then Sheriff frowned as he felt his phone buzzed in his pocket.

“What’s that?” Stella asked curiously.

“Someone’s breaking into my house” Sheriff answered, turning off the notification and checking his phone to see what the problem was. “After Stiles started sleepwalking, I had some security precautions put in.” Allison and Stella leaned into the phone one of them on Sheriff’s right side, the other is on his left sight, listening to him and also looking at the phone. “Motion sensors. Cameras.”

Allison frowned. “Is that his room?” Allison asked when a footage popped up on the screen. Right when Stella was about to confirm her, she noticed something. She looked closer and saw Stiles with bags underneath his eyes, looking all psychotic. He looked like he hasn’t sept since the beginning of the earth.

As they all held their breath, Stiles looked directly at the camera and waved at them like he knew they were watching him.

“What is all this?” Chris asked, looking, and pointing at the chess board with all the pink notes and things written on them. Stella saw Derek’s, Scott’s, Allison’s, and her name on the board when Chris asked another question with confused expression on his face. “What are these sticky notes for?”

“This is what Stiles used to try and explain to me about all of you” Sheriff answered the Argent, causing everyone to look at the board.

“Cool, maybe it’s a message from Stiles” Allison said, looking at the pieces on the board. It was all mess, that’s why she thought the way she thought. “The real Stiles.”

Stella frowned as she crossed her arms in front of her chest, her eyes moving on the chess board. Chris grabbed a pawn that was outside the board, frowned and looked at who it was supposed to be representing. The pink sticky note said Isaac.

“Does anybody here have an idea why my name is on the king?” Derek asked with a scowl, causing Stella to look at the part that the King was on. It had the queen near the king and the pieces that represented Aiden, Ethan and Peter were right in front of it.

“Well, you’re heavily guarded” Stella said, looking at Derek as she straightened up. “Though I guess the alarming detail is that…” She pointed the part she was talking about. “You’re one move away from being in checkmate.” She uncrossed her arms with a deep sigh and put them in her jean’s pocket. “It’s not a message from Stiles. It’s a threat from the Nogitsune.” She grimaced and pointed Derek. “Well, it’s a threat from the Nogitsune to you but I guess, I’m not supposed to bring that up?” She saw his expression and nodded. “Yeah, okay. Got it.”

Allison felt the guilt again, seeing them like that but she had to focus, she looked at Derek, Chris, Sheriff and Stella one by one. “He’s at the loft” she said. “That’s what he’s trying to tell us.”

“And he wants us to come here” Chris continued, looking at sheriff.

“Night’s falling” Derek notified them, looking away from the board.

Chris’ eyes moved on the people in Stiles’ room. “This couldn’t sound any more like a trap.”

“I don’t think it is” Sheriff disagree.

Chris looked at him. His expression was saying a lot. “I think your opinion might be slightly biased, Sheriff” he said.

“Hear me out” Sheriff fought back, looking at the Argent. “What we’re dealing with here is basically someone who lacks motive. No rhyme, no reason, right?” Chris’ expression was asking what his point was, he was confused. “Our enemy is not a killer. It’s a trickster. The killing is just a by-product.”

“If you’re trying to say it won’t kill us…” Derek interrupted them, raised his eyebrows. “I’m not feeling too confident about that.”

“It won’t” Sheriff repeated himself causing Stella to frown at how sure he was. In the other hand, the others were probably having some doubts on that. “It wants irony. It wants to play a trick. It wants a joke. All we need to do is come up with a new punch line.”

“The sun is setting, Sheriff” Chris informed. “What do you have in mind.”

“You want to save Stiles?” Noshiko asked firmly, looking at Scott who was looking at her back. “Kill him.” Kira’s eyes moved between Scott and then back to her mother. “That’s the only way.”

Scott looked at Mr. Yukimura, not wanting to believe that. “You agree with this?” he asked in disbelief, frustrated, angry.

Ken didn’t like it as much as Scott and Kira but as he sighed deeply, he looked at the young alpha werewolf. “Sometimes, history does repeat itself, Scott” he said, causing Scott to shake his head and look at both of them at the same time.

“Only if you don’t learn” he fought back. He wanted to save Stiles. He had to save him. He just needed to.

“But sometimes even then, fate conspires against you.” Hearing that, Scott said nothing. He was just looking at them in disbelief, not wanting to believe anything they said when his phone buzzed with a new text.

**Stella – Derek’s loft**

Scott looked away from the text, looked at Noshiko. “There’s a way to save him. There has to be.” And without saying anything else, he turned around and walked out of the classroom they were in.

“Kira” Noshiko stopped her daughter from following Scott. Kira turned around, looked at her mother who grabbed the sword from the table and handed it over to her. Kira took the sword, put it inside its scabbard and without anything else, she ran after Scott.

It’s been a while now that he was alone with his wife in his classroom. He turned to look at her, worried about his daughter. “History has not done well with making children into killers” he said.

“These children played their part in it long before we came back to Beacon Hills” Noshiko replied as she looked away from her husband and looked at the door Scott and Kira walked out from. She took a breath. “I buried the jar deep within the roots of the Nemeton. It was their sacrifice that brought its power back.” She shook her head. “They let the demon out of its cage.”

Sheriff slid the door open with the others leaning against the wall in the blind spot, hiding themselves from Stiles as they were waiting for their time to come out and help Sheriff Stilinski out.

“Hi dad” Stiles said with an exhausted voice. How tired he sounded; he was awake as much. But he also looked so pale, like he was barely standing but Sheriff knew if he was the Nogitsune, he was gonna be strong as hell. Sheriff took out the handcuffs. “You want to handcuff me?” Stiles continued while Stella pressed her lips together, trying to control her heart beating as she was listening in on them.

“If my son is still there, if there’s a still a part of him standing here in front of me, then he’ll put these on willingly and he’ll come with me” Sheriff said, walking towards Stiles slowly. Stella rested her head against the wall; sheriff continued. “Because he knows I’m here to protect him from himself and from others.” As Stiles was putting on the handcuffs, Stella and the others didn’t hear anything for a while but then they heard the Sheriff. “You’re not my son.”

Stella looked at her uncle who already took out his gun, and her cousin who was holding a taser. Her gun was still hanging on her belt for the moment but then, they heard a chain breaking voice and they all barged into the room.

Derek, Allison, Chris, and Stella walked inside in the same rhythm and watching that, Stiles formed up a smile on his face like everything was going according to his plan.

Allison stood right next to the sheriff, causing Nogitsune to look at her and then she hit him with the taser, letting the electrocuted arms go on him.

Did not work.

Stiles grabbed the wires and without hurting himself, he pulled them and threw them away from her, leaving Allison without a weapon and in shock.

Derek roared, and glowed his eyes as he run to attack Stiles but with one movement, Stiles took care of him too. He threw him to the wall, causing him to fall to the ground with a groan and then all of a sudden there was a dead silence. Because Chris was pointing his gun right at his face and what caused the silence was that gun cocking that echoed when Chris turned its safety on.

Stella held her breath, her hand went to her belt where she was keeping her gun. Meanwhile Sheriff turned to the Argent. “Argent, listen to me” he said, holding his hand up as he was trying calm Chris down with his body language. “Don’t do this.”

“Why not?” Chris asked, only looking at Stiles… The Nogitsune. “I’ve done it before. Werewolves, berserkers… I can easily add a Nogitsune to the list.”

Hearing, that Sheriff pulled up his gun and pointed at Chris. Stiles’ lips formed up an ‘o’ playfully and enjoying the chaos occurring in front of him. Sheriff parted his lips, spoke in a sharp voice. “You’re _not_ going to shoot my son.”

“You said it yourself, Sheriff” Chris reminded him, still his eyes were on the Nogitsune. “He is not your son.”

Stella and Allison’s eyes were moving between them, Derek was still on the ground. Sheriff parted his lips. “Put it down” he said. “Put it down.”

“Dad, he’s going to shoot me” the Nogitsune said, talking like Stiles. Stella pressed her lips together; her eyes were on Stiles. Everybody knew he was lying his ass off; he was just trying to create more chaos as he was adding more log to the fire. It was just another game. Another damn game… “He’s going to kill me, Dad.”

“Don’t listen” Chris warned Sheriff who was looking at his son from the corner of his eyes. But when he heard Chris, he looked back at him.

“Put it down” he said while the others were just feeling useless because all Derek, Allison and Stella could do was to stand there and watch Chris, Sheriff and Stiles. “Now! Do it!” Sheriff shouted when Chris didn’t do as he was told. “Put it down!”

And then Stiles turned to look at Chris with a sick smile. “Pull the trigger” he said, challenging him. “Come on.”

And that’s when things got more chaotic. Stiles was challenging Chris to pull the trigger while Sheriff kept telling Chris to put the gun down, he was shouting at him, but no one was listening to anybody. Stiles kept telling Chris to shoot him, Sheriff kept telling Chris to put it down.

That’s when Allison quickly parted her lips. “Dad” she said. No one heard her except for Stella and Derek who were looking each other, not knowing what to do while the others kept shouting at each other. Stella looked at Allison, thinking what she was thinking. “Strife” she murmured while Stella looked outside, seeing the sun setting down. Her brown eyes looked at Allison again, telling her that they were running out time. Allison decided to try again. “Stop, stop it!” she shouted. “This is what he wants. This is exactly what he wants!”

Everyone stopped arguing. Nogitsune looked at his left, at Allison and tilted his head. “Not exactly” he murmured with a smirk and when he looked at Stella, Stella felt her heart pounding, scared that what he might say. “Come on Stella. Bring out your gun, join the fun. I know you have it on you.” Stella gulped, her hand moving to her belt automatically. Stiles continued with a smirk. “What was that sentence you told Stiles? _I want to prove myself_? Here’s your chance.” He opened his hands, pointing the people around them who were looking at them in confusion. Stella could feel Allison and Chris’ eyes on her. “Show everyone that you can be just as good as Allison.” He sighed and looked outside the window, seeing how dark it was now that the sun was gone, and it was night. “I was kind of hoping Scott would be here as well, but I’m glad you all have your guns with you. Because you’re not here to kill me.” Then the onis appeared out of thin ear, forming from the shadows, in front of the large windows. Stella startled, quickly took out her gun.

Stiles started backing up, the onis took out their guns and Stella found herself shouting. “What the hell are we supposed to do now?”

Stiles smirked. “Protect me” he said and walked behind them, taking them as cover.

Stella, the Sheriff and Chris started shooting but none of the bullets were working on the ninjas. They were fighting with everything they’ve got but nothing was happening. Chris ran out of bullet. He threw his gun to the side, took out his spare one and kept shooting. Meanwhile Derek and Allison were standing behind Stiles, facing the door as they were getting ready to fight the onis.

When Scott and Kira appeared in front of the door, panting, Stella pulled up her gun with reflex but when she saw it was just them, she dropped her hand, panting and breathing heavily. She was exhausted from all the fighting and she wasn’t alone in this either.

Scott frowned, looking at them. Derek and Chris were on the ground, tired. Allison, Sheriff and Stella were standing. Also tired. “What happened?” he asked curiously.

“They disappeared” Stella answered, looking at Scott. “They literally vanished.”

As Scott and Kira walked to them, Sheriff took a breath as his eyes found the couple. He sighed in defeat. “And so did Stiles.”


	22. DE-VOID

The Argents were quiet as they walked out of the elevator but when Chris opened the door to their apartment, Allison sighed as she looked at her father who was pulling the key to himself, pushing the door so that it would open. “Dad” Allison called out, stopping in front of the door. Chris stopped walking, looked at his daughter and Stella who were looking at him curiously with a burning question inside them. “Were you really gonna pull the trigger on Stiles?”

“To be honest, I’m not sure” Chris answered her, thoughtfully looking at her. The girls walked in, following Chris. Stella bit her lower lip as she closed the door behind them.

She looked at her uncle. “I’ll check the firing pin” Stella murmured, walking in front of Chris. Allison didn’t react as she knew her plan way before, just to have an insurance. But Chris was surprised as far as Stella could tell from his face. He raised his eyebrows up, looking at his niece. He was shock but Stella could sense another emotion from there. He was tough and maybe angry a little bit, but it didn’t affect Stella a bit. She just kept looking at him. 

“You removed it?” Chris questioned, looking directly at his niece. Stella pressed her lips together, making them a straight line and nodded as she shrugged.

“I couldn’t just let you shoot him when we can still find a way to save him” Stella responded, confident and determined. 

A smile formed on Chris’ face. His hand went through Stella’s hair, brushing it back slowly, sincerely. “That’s why the women are the leaders in our family.” Stella smiled softly and a little broken. She softly tilted her hand, resting her cheek on her uncle’s hand. “Get some sleep, okay?”

Stella nodded and after watching Chris walk away to his study, she looked at Allison when she felt her gaze on her. “Argent Girls?” she asked slowly and silently. Stella tightened her lips more but nodded once again, making Allison smile. They walked up to their separate rooms, changed into comfortable clothes, and then met up in the kitchen, getting every junk food that there was and headed to the staircase to the roof.

They sat on the roof, put the food around them and looked at the bright dark sky with full of stars. Stella sighed. She was a person who always cut to the chase. “So” she said underneath hear breath, looked at Allison who nodded, knowing what was next. They had to talk about it, and she could only hope that Stella would understand her. “Are you gonna tell me why you haven’t told me about my mom’s real death?” Stella asked, crossed her legs on the ground and looked at Allison. “You gonna tell me why you’ve lied?”

“Yes” Allison nodded. She could babble and talk non-sense but none of them would help her. She knew that. So, she decided to be open, she decided to tell the truth. Allison sighed, turned her head to look at Stella. “It was because of the nightmares I saw because of it.” She exhaled and continued. “Stella, I know you have parasomnia _and_ insomnia. I know what you were going through even without actually knowing because you didn’t tell me. I know the nightmares that keep you awake. And-”

Stella interrupted her. “And you didn’t tell me because I’m weak?” she guessed, completing her sentence. Allison sighed, knowing this question was going to be thrown at her. “Because you thought I couldn’t handle it?”

“No” Allison responded with a soft and understanding smile. “Because I thought you _could_ handle it. Because I thought you were… I think you are too strong for your own good sometimes.” Stella frowned, listening to her cousin. She was definitely confused, and Allison noticed that. She sighed again. And then took a deep breath before she spoke again. “Stella, you came back to Beacon Hills even though you were scared of the nightmares and the hallucinations. You came back because you’re strong. And I knew if I told you, you’d be handling it so well and so alone that _if_ …” She emphasized on the ‘if’ and continued. “… you couldn’t, you wouldn’t be telling anyone.” She pressed her lips together for a split second. “You wouldn’t be telling me.”

Stella’s face dropped, thinking about what she said. She got quiet for a moment as she looked down at her fingers that she was playing with. “Even with you, I…” She slightly shook her head. “I’m not used to…”

She couldn’t finish the sentence, but Allison understood. “I know” she said with a smile. “You’re a lone wolf. You’ve always been, and I admire that about you. I do. But there are moments that you need people in your life. And me telling this burden to you would only cause you to be alone more because you don’t ask for help. You never did. You would want to carry this on your own and I didn’t want that.” Allison’s tongue moved on her lips as she reached out for Stella’s hand. She squeezed it and parted her lips. “You are strong, Stella. You are the strongest person I’ve ever met.” She tilted her head. “But sometimes…”

Stella nodded, understanding. “But sometimes, I try to be too strong” she finished her sentences. She knew it. This was what she was used to because of everything she’s been through over the years.

“Yeah” Allison murmured. “You need to let people in. You need to accept their help and you need to know they are there because they love you.”

“I want to” Stella said, shaking her head up and down. “I want to, I just… I don’t know how to do that. Not completely.”

“It can start tonight” Allison helped, smiling, comforting her cousin. “Take baby steps. It’s the Argent Girls night. You can do it. Start with me. We have the whole night ahead of us. We both need this, Stella.”

Stella smiled, pulled her into a hug. “I love you Ally” she murmured into her neck, her head between Allison’s shoulder and her head.

Allison’s hand went between Stella’s hair with a soft smile on her face. “I love you, too, Ella.” She placed a kiss on her forehead and pulled away. She reached out for the first drink she grabbed and put it in the air, looking at Stella. “So, cheers?”

Stella raised her eyebrows. “Allison, that’s an orange juice” she scoffed.

“Yeah, my dad wouldn’t let us have alcohol and he is still in the study, so I couldn’t grab any beer” Allison explained herself, causing Stella to laugh softly at her. “So, cheers?”

Stella smiled, grabbed the other orange juice, and hit Allison’s can softly. “Cheers.”

One hour later they were still up on the roof, more relaxed and laughing their asses off because of a story Stella told Allison about her time in New York. They’ve already run out of Cheetos and it was nice here, talking with her. It’s been a while and Allison missed Stella.

“Okay” Allison said, trying to get herself to stop laughing. It’s been a while since they were laughing this hard together. But she pushed this thought away for the moment and looked at her cousin’s beautiful face. “What about Aiden?”

The laughter on Stella’s face faded into a soft and acrid smile. She reached for a bar of chocolate and shrugged. “Okay, what about Isaac?” she asked back as a defense, looking at her cousin. She didn’t really want to talk about Aiden after her meltdown in the elevator and she had to just divert the topic away from her.

“Ella” Allison said underneath her breath. She knew what Stella was trying to do but after today, she felt like she needed to dig in more. They had to talk about it. “You know everything that’s been happening between me and Scott and Isaac, but I have no idea what’s happening between you and Aiden. Including how you feel about him.”

Stella took a deep breath and took a sip from her cup of coffee that she made for the two of them. “That makes two of us” she murmured underneath her breath. Allison started looking at her, questioning what she’s just said and Stella knowing that, she sighed and hit her hands together before she turned her whole body to look at Allison. She thought, nothing was happening when she wasn’t talking about it and in fact, it was actually getting worse. Maybe this time, if she chose to talk, it would be a lot better. At least, she could let Allison know it. Like she said, she had to start at some point. “Okay. Here is the thing Ally.” She took a deep breath. “I’ve never told anyone that I loved them except you. Not to my mom who gave birth to me. Not to my grandparents who looked after me all those years and not to my uncle who was one of the very few people who actually knew how smart and amazing I am.” Allison found herself chuckling at the way she described Chris. Meanwhile Stella continued. “God knows, even Stiles who was the first person I trusted completely, after you of course… The guy that I spent most of my time with, again after Aiden… We had the same classes and stuff… Even he probably thinks that I hate him. And by the way, I talked to him about things that I’ve never told anyone before.” Stella took a deep breath and looked at her hands, moving them nervously. “I’m not… I’m not good with any emotions other than anger and… And sadness. New York was different. I didn’t have to feel anything.” She thought about someone she knew from New York, but she pushed his memory away. She didn’t have to think about him now. She scoffed with the memory though. “You would regret it anyway if you ever did. But Beacon Hills… It’s different. A lot different.” She moved her shoulders in frustration. “I’m here right now and I’m feeling emotions that I can’t even name and it makes me wanna kill someone.” She took another deep breath. “I care about Aiden, yes. I can’t even deny that after that night when he almost died and yes, we… We do spend some time together but… I don’t know if I lo…” She paused. She just couldn’t say the word. “I don’t know if I have feelings for him or just, you know, messing around with him. Beacon Hills is like a freaking feeling market and the worst part is that ever since I got here, I have to feel everything I want and everything I don’t want. I’m just…” Stella looked at Allison. “I just feel too tired to deal with everything sometimes.”

Allison frowned, looking at Stella who actually looked very exhausted as she talked about all of this for the first time. “How do you feel when you’re with him?” she asked curiously, trying to help her cousin and Stella thought about it. She actually thought about it. She wanted no more unknown stuff in her mind.

“Annoyed” Stella said, causing Allison to laugh. Stella shook her head, added a ghost of a smile on her face, looked down at her hands. “I feel definitely annoyed. Irritated. Frustrated. Both sexually and mentally.” Allison grimaced causing Stella to laugh but then she got serious again and she softly shook her head, continued. “But at the same time… I feel safe? I don’t know. I feel… Silent.” Allison smiled, knowing what ‘silent’ meant to her. But Stella shook her head, feeling overwhelmed.

“What about Stiles?” Allison questioned with a frown as the memory of them kissing in the party came to her mind. She was looking at her with her eyebrows raised up, wonderingly, waiting for her to answer.

“What do you mean what about Stiles?” Stella confusedly asked with a frown.

“I saw you guys kissing the other day at the party” Allison explained herself and then she shrugged. “I’ve been meaning to talk to you about his, but we never got a chance and then there was…”

Stella nodded. “Oh, that” she smiled nervously. Stella shrugged. “Stiles… He’s like a brother to me and it kills me seeing him like that because…” She stopped before she said too much. The nightmare in the hospital played in the back of her mind. She didn’t want Allison to know about this. She didn’t want to worry her more than she already was. “I don’t know. I mean… Me and Stiles… We understand each other. And that kiss was…”

Then it hit Allison. She nodded. “Oh” she murmured, with an understanding smile. “Aiden.”

Stella pressed her lips to each other, forming a nervous smile on her face. “Yeah, Aiden was watching. Stiles was there. Definitely not my greatest or proudest moment” she responded but then paused. She grinned. “Well, actually I was very proud for a second there when I saw Aiden’s face. So that’s not entirely true and Stiles was so understanding about all that so…” She shrugged, continued. “I just… I don’t know Ally. All of this is… It’s new to me. So new. It wasn’t like that in New York. I came here and I had friends that I couldn’t even dream of.” She sighed before she continued. “Back in New York, a single police siren would cause everyone to run, leaving everyone behind.” She straightened up. “Back there, everyone’s on their own. Everyone looks out for their own ass. But in here… You guys deal with supernatural creatures, fighting for your lives and no one gets left behind.” Stella looked at Allison. “I don’t like the things I’m feeling, Allison. Because It’s making me feel like I’m weak.”

“It’s not weakness Ella. It’s strength” Allison assured her, wrapping her arms around her cousin’s shoulder, pulling her into a soft half hug. She sighed. “And we don’t leave people we care about, people we love behind, and I love you Stella. This will never, ever change. Even if you come up with a stupid and dangerous plan like robbing an armored car or be a supernatural being.”

Stella first laughed but then she noticed what Allison said. She pulled herself away from the hug, looked directly at Allison, gasping. “Did you just-”

Allison inhaled, nodding as her brown eyes were on Stella. “I know the reason why you’ve been pushing me away and I understand you Ella” she answered the question Stella couldn’t finish asking in shock. “I really do. But I also need my best friend with me.”

Without thinking, Stella leaned into Allison, pulling her into a tight hug. “I’m sorry” she murmured. She thought about how selfish was for the last couple of months. She’s been going through something, but Allison was also having moment of her own. She understood that better in the hospital, the elevator to be exact but she thought about herself again. She sighed. “I just… I… I didn’t wanna upset you. I love you Allison.”

“I love you” Allison said back, making Stella smile.

Stella pulled away from the hug. “I promise, I’m not going to shut you out again” she said with a smile. “I’m not going to leave you alone.” And then ironically, she stood up cleaning the dusts away from her sweatpants.

Allison frowned with a smile, looked at the young girl. “What the hell?” she asked playfully. “I thought you weren’t going to leave me alone, Argent.”

Stella laughed. “Of course, I’m not” she said. “After today.” She moved her eyebrows playfully. “I have to meet with Aiden.”

“You could’ve stayed a little while?” Allison suggested, tilting her head, giving her the puppy eyes and then she shrugged. “My dad is probably still up. You shouldn’t get caught.” Stella paused. That was true. She shrugged and sat back next to Allison who kept looking at her. “You’re disgusting, by the way.” Stella knew what she was talking about. As she burst into laughter, Allison rolled her eyes, but she was happy, being back with her cousin again. Like the old times.

“Turn right onto Lincoln Road and continue for half a mile” the Automated GPS voice instructed them. Stella pressed her lips together, doing as she was told behind the wheel and looked at Aiden from the corner of her eyes who parted his lips to speak up.

Aiden sighed. “You at least going to tell me where we’re going?” he questioned turning his head to look at the young girl who was sitting on the passenger seat. He smirked and continued. “We could’ve stayed home, you know, finished our conversation.”

Stella wanted to smile with the thought of them finishing ‘their’ conversation, but she just shook it off and parted her lips. “I told you that before” she murmured, biting her lip afterwards to prevent a smile. “I need to check on something.”

Aiden leaned into the piece of paper he saw and as he grabbed it, he raised his eyebrows up, reading what was written on it. “Who is Malia Tate?” he asked, looking at the paper but pronouncing it in a wrong way.

“it’s mah-Leah” she corrected him and then quickly snatched the paper away from his hands then and put it back next to her phone. “And you don’t need to worry about it.”

“If I don’t need to worry about it…” Aiden started, grinning from mouth to ear as he was teasing her. “Why are you dragging me with you?”

“Maybe I don’t wanna be alone” Stella responded, putting on a sarcastic smile as he looked at Aiden. If he could tease her about this, then she could tease him as well. “Why didn’t you say no when I asked you to come with me then?”

All Aiden did was smile as he nodded. He got nothing to say.

But the GPS lady had. “Turn right onto Harmon Street and stay right.”

Stella turned to right again, Aiden moved his eyebrows looking outside the window. “Well, I’m actually a little worried we’re totally lost” he said after a while.

Stella sighed, kept looking ahead. “Why do you think that?” she questioned, looking at Aiden for only a second as she kept driving and listening to the GPS.

“Because…” he said starting his explanation as he stretched the word. “You just made your fourth right. And four rights make a circle.”

Stella frowned, looked at Aiden in denial. “I did not!” she denied but for some reason she wasn’t so sure. She kept her eyes on the road, gulped down. “Did I?” Aiden moved her eyebrows yes causing Stella to sigh anxiously but found herself trying to find excuses for this. “It’s a brand-new car. The GPS was fine before.”

“Maybe the GPS would work better if it was on” Aiden reacted, raising his brows up, causing Stella to straightened up on her seat. She squeezed the steering wheel without she intended to as her eyes moved to the GPS, only to see it was actually not open. Her lips fell apart, nervously in shock. She started pushing the buttons with her heart racing up. Aiden looked at Stella, worried. “Stella, you okay?”

“I need to stop” Stella murmured and started turning the wheel like a maniac with anxiety and heart beats rising up. “I need to pull over right now!”

“Stella” Aiden said, holding the first thing he could hold inside the car. “Stella!” That’s when they both saw the body laying down on the ground. Stella gasped as Aiden shouted. “Stella, stop!”

The minute Stella stopped the car, they got out and walked towards to the body that was laying on the ground. Aiden put his hand in front of Stella as he was trying to protect her but then they saw the face of the body. They knew who it was.

It was Stiles.

“The couch” Scott instructed in hurry as he was carrying Stiles with the help of Aiden. “Put him on the coach.” As Aiden put Stiles in Lydia’s car to get to somewhere safe and off the road, Stella called Lydia and Scott to tell them what happened. Scott told her to get him to his house, meanwhile Lydia told her she felt the same thing but for some weird reason, none of them thought he was dead or dying.

At least for the time being.

“Guys, this is crazy” Melissa said as Deaton was taking care of Stiles after Scott and Aiden placed him on the couch. Young woman was playing with her fingers nervously as her eyes were on Stiles who was not moving and looking like he was dead. “He needs to be in the hospital.”

“Melissa” Stella murmured, biting her nails nervously as her eyes were also on Stiles. “I don’t mean to disagree with you but remember what happened the last time he went to the hospital?” When Stella looked at Melissa, only turning her body with her arms crossed, she saw her nodding as she was agreeing with her.

In the meantime, Deaton pulled up Stiles’ cut shirt to check his wound better. “It doesn’t look like he’s bleeding” Deaton announced, frowning. “I think he might even be healing.”

“You mean healing like we heal?” Aiden questioned, looking at Scott and then back at Deaton. He was confused as the rest of them were and didn’t know what to do.

“That’s good, right?” Scott asked.

“For him, yes” Deaton answered with a low voice as he stepped away from Stiles and pointed him with his head. And then continued. “Us?” His brown eyes found Scott. “I’m not sure.”

Melissa sighed, grabbing her phone quickly to give Sheriff a call to let him know about his son when Aiden softly shrugged. “Why don’t we just kill him now?” he asked curiously. Stella rolled her eyes, started pacing down in the living room as she was trying to think of what they were gonna do. Aiden continued again. “I mean, wouldn’t that be just a lot easier for us?”

“For the last time Aiden” Stella said, stopped pacing and looked at the werewolf. “We’re not going to kill him.”

“Well, if we’re not going to kill him, why aren’t we at least tying him down with really big chains?” He asked this time. He wasn’t a big fan of Stiles, mainly because of his attitude but Nogitsune? Yeah. Aiden hated that spirit for so many reasons.

“I might have something more effective” Deaton said, grabbing his suitcase. He opened the case, grabbed a small black bottle. He looked at Aiden and Scott to tell them to keep him still. They nodded, walked to Stiles, and held him down and still for Deaton to put that Kanima venom in the bottle to his body a lot safer and easily.

But right when the Kanima venom met with Stiles’ tongue, he started grunting. Suddenly, he opened his eyes and grabbed Aiden’s wrist with one hand and the other hand grabbed his throat, squeezing it with a smile. Stella’s hands dropped to her sides and somehow acted way faster than Scott, ran to Aiden’s help. “Get him off me! Get him off me!” he shouted as he was trying to get away from Stiles who was still gripping him tight with a sick and deadly grin on his pale face.

As the Kanima venom worked its wonders, Stiles was unable to control his body. He loosened his grip on Aiden, Stella pulled him back. Her hand was on his shoulder, looking at him as she was asking if he was fine. Aiden let out a breath as he nodded at Stella.

“Kanima venom” Stiles said, his hand is shaky in the air, losing the control slowly but effectively. Stella looked at Stiles, her hand moved down to Aiden’s arm. “Nice touch.” As he lost control of his body, Aiden shook Stella’s hand away. His claws came out and roared at Stiles, but Stiles didn’t even flinch. His sick eyes looked at Aiden, mockingly. “You know how they say that twins get a feeling when the other one’s in pain? You didn’t lose that talent, too, did you? Oh, I hope not. You’re going to need it.” Aiden was looking at Stiles with dead stares but with the thing he said, Aiden and Stella looked at each other for a second, not understanding what he was talking about. Stiles chuckled; Aiden looked at Stiles again with a scowl. “Okay, I’ll give you a little hint. Ethan’s at the school.”

Apparently, Aiden didn’t know if he should go to school or not because even though he was furious and worried, he was looking at Stella, worried about her as well. But Stella had something else in mind. “Go” she said, louder. They could manage but apparently with Stiles’ finger in it, Ethan needed help. “We’ll be… I’ll be fine.” Aiden quickly nodded and ran out of the house, leaving them alone with Stiles.

Stiles rested his head back, watching him leave and laughed like all of this were just fun games. He was enjoying their situation. “Oh, I hope he gets there in time” Stiles said, still laughing. “I like the twins.” He looked at Scott, Stella, Lydia, Deaton, and Melissa with a grin. “Short tempers. Homicidal compulsions. They’re a lot more fun than you bakemono trying to save the world every day.” He looked at Stella. “Although, that Argent over there also has very good homicidal compulsions.” He winked. “That’s why you’re my favorite.”

“Doc, you brought something to paralyze his body” Stella murmured angrily, crossing her arms in front of her chest. “You got anything for his mouth that he keeps talking nonsense with?”

“Yes, I do” doctor responded. He took out a tape from his bag, ripped it and placed it roughly on Stiles’ mouth, shutting them up but causing him to chuckle and then shout.

“How much longer do you think we have?” Scott asked, walking inside his kitchen, and looking at Lydia, Deaton and Stella who were trying to find something that they could do but so far, there was nothing. Stella stopped weighting on her hands and straightened up as she looked at Scott, sighed.

Deaton shrugged. “I wish I knew” he said, taking a deep breath. “But if we don’t figure out something soon, we’re going to need to find a better place to keep him. I think we’re grossly underestimating the danger here.” Stella stopped pacing around in the room nervously, looking at Deaton who kept speaking as he pointed the Stiles who was still paralyzed and sitting on the couch in the living room. “He might be paralyzed, but it still feels like he’s got us right in the palm of his hand.”

“But the scroll said to change his body” Lydia reminded, looking at the people around her. She took a deep breath.

“That’s if I translated it correctly” Deaton responded as he looked at the teenagers around him in the kitchen. “We’re looking for a cure in something that might actually be nothing more than a proverb or a metaphor.”

“And what if he doesn’t want it?” Scott asked, stopped walking around. He placed his hands down on the table and looked at Stella and Lydia. “He’s never asked to be a werewolf.”

Stella stopped biting her nails and crossed her arms in front of her chest and then looked at Scott. “What if it saves his life?” she asked, thinking about their chances.

“What if it kills him?” Stella tightened her lips with the thought that Scott just said out loud. The Alpha continued. “I’ve never done this before” Scott fought back, feeling the anxiety level he’s been feeling. He was worried about his best friend, but he had no idea what to do and that only made things worse for his situation. “I mean, what if I bite him and accidentally hit an artery or something?”

Stella shook her head, dropped her shoulder down, uncrossing them. “So many possibilities Scott and so little time we have. You’re going to have to choose something eventually. Something needs to be done sooner than later. We need to do something. The venom is not going to last longer.” She shook her head one more time, pointing the living room that was Stiles in. “I don’t know what the hell he did to Ethan. I don’t know if Aiden is okay. We can’t get a hold on Derek and if you ask me, it’s something to do with his little weird fox games and according to Allison’s text message, he has Isaac right in his palm.” Stella took a deep breath, looking at Scott. “Do you have any idea how much I’m trying to remind myself that he is… That Stiles is trapped somewhere inside him, and I cannot do anything to him right now? But we have to do something because we are running out of time.”

As Deaton nodded, agreeing with the young girl, Scott sighed in distress. “I can try calling Derek again” he said as a murmur.

Stella shook her head one more time. “I’ve tried few minutes ago. He didn’t answer.” Stella and Lydia looked at each other, both thinking the same thing. Stella moved her tongue on her lips nervously as her eyes found Scott again. She knew it was a terrible plan, but they had no other choice. “But maybe… Maybe we should call someone else.”

They had no other choice other than Peter Hale.

Stella sat on the couch in front of Stiles in an angle that no one else could see her since they were all still in the kitchen, talking. Stella sighed and looked at Stiles who still looked like he was enjoying everything that’s been happening. She quickly ripped off the tape and looked at him. “You know what the hell’s been happening to me” she said, keeping her voice low. There was a sarcastic sick grin on the Nogitsune’s face and Stella could feel the anger rising inside her. “Tell me.”

Stiles chuckled playfully. “And, uh, why would I wanna do that?” he asked, grinning. Stella sighed in anger, checked the people who were still talking in the other room and looked back at Stiles.

“I’m gonna find a way to kill you without hurting Stiles, I hope you know that” she said strictly. She was determined. And as she continued, she didn’t change her attitude. She shook her head. “You’re not going to hurt anyone that I ever cared about.”

“Oh, is that so?” Nogitsune asked. He couldn’t control his body yet, but he raised his eyebrows amusingly. “Because it looks like I already did.” He took a breath. “You see. Isaac, Aiden, and Ethan… All three of them are at school. Allison and Kira are probably going there to stop them. Now, we all know that you don’t like Kira but Allison? You don’t ever wanna lose her, right?” Stella clenched her teeth with anger while Stiles kept looking at Stella, really enjoying her suffering. “Should I continue? Because I also happen to know Derek is going to pay a visit to Chris.” He laughed. “You do know what that means, don’t you?” Stiles laughed one more time before Stella put the tape back on and quickly stood up, walked to the kitchen.

“Where the hell is Peter?” she shouted and then the doorbell rang. Stella quickly made her way to the door, opened it, and saw Peter standing there with a smile.

“He doesn’t look like he would survive a slap across the face, much less the bite of a werewolf” Peter observed, walking around Stiles, looking at Stiles as he was examining him. Meanwhile the others were just listening to him since they had nothing better else to do.

“You don’t think it would work?” Scott asked with a straight face.

“This is more a war of the mind than the body” Peter murmured, still looking at Stiles’ pale and ill looking face. The bags underneath Stiles’ eyes kept getting purple and worse by the minute. It was looking like he wasn’t sleeping for the last thousand years. Meanwhile, Peter straightened up and looked at them. “There are better methods to winning this battle.”

Deaton frowned. “What kind of methods?” he asked.

Peter grabbed Scott’s hand and caused his claws to come out as he started to grin. “We’re going to get into his head.”

Stella frowned as she looked at Lydia who was talking something with Peter, but she decided to think about it later as they had something else that they had to think about. She sighed and then looked at Scott. “Okay, even though ‘we get into his head’ plan is the only plan we have right now, and I don’t wanna admit it but it’s also the only plan that makes sense but…” Stella said underneath her breath. She sighed and pointed Stiles with her head as she kept looking at the alpha. “Scott, I got inside his head before and believe me, it’s no vacation material.”

“As you said…” Scott sighed. “It’s the only plan we have.”

Stella nodded, knowing that and as Lydia and Peter finished their conversation and started walking to their direction, Deaton looked at Peter. “So, do we have a plan?” he asked.

Peter nodded with a grin. “Scott is going to try and dig through pale and sickly Evil Stiles’ mind to unearth pale and sickly Real Stiles” he responded, looking at them. “Then guide him back from the depths of his own subconscious. But he’s not going to do it alone.”

Scott frowned. “What do you mean?” he asked curiously.

Peter’s eyes found Stella and Lydia and as they noticed him, their eyes opened widely in shock. Peter parted his lips, pointed the girls. “Those two banshees need to go in with you.” Peter moved his brows. “Well, especially Stella.”

Even Stiles’ eyes moved to them, Stella grimaced. “Okay, first, I know it’s a long shot but what about playing Marco Polo with pale and sickly Evil Stiles to get the pale and sickly Real Stiles out of his own mind?” She asked and quickly added. “Because like I said before, I’ve been to Stiles’ subconscious before and it wasn’t one of my greatest experiences.” As everyone looked at her in disbelief, like they were trying to see if she was serious, Stella sighed and continued. “And second…” She looked at Peter. “Why ‘especially’ me?”

Peter grinned, looking at Stella. “You already know the answer Stella” he answered, confusing everyone except for Stella. She sighed in defeat, looked down. “I don’t need to explain it to you.”

“How am I supposed to do it?” Scott asked, slightly turning his head to look at Peter. Scott was standing behind Stiles, Stella and Lydia who sitting next to each other on Stiles’ left on the same couch. He still had no control of his body so there was no problem of Lydia sitting next to him. “I only have two hands and you told me the claw the back of their necks.”

Peter rolled his eyes as he was asking if he was being serious and then grabbed Scott’s clawed out hands, placed it on the right spot on Stiles’ neck. “Stella has her own powers for it” he answered, shrugging, and putting his other hand on Lydia’s neck. He looked at Stella with a grin. “If Lydia holds her hand before the whole trip to Stiles’ mind, she should be just fine. You don’t need to worry about her.” Hearing that, Lydia quickly grabbed Stella’s hand and sent her an ensuring smile but to be honest, she was as worried as they all were. The void Stiles has already caused a lot of damage to a lot of people and now they had to get inside his mind. Besides, Stella’s review about the place was not comforting at all. 

Stella held Lydia’s hand back and sighed. “It’s gonna be like a stroll in the park” she murmured, mainly trying to calm herself down.

Scott looked at his claws and then Peter. “So, what do we do if we find him?” he curiously asked.

“You’re going to have to guide him out somehow” Peter answered. He sent Scott a fake smile that didn’t comfort Scott or anyone else at all. “Try to give him back control of his mind, of his body.”

“Could you elaborate on the ‘somehow’?” Lydia asked with an anxious voice, not relaxed at all. Then she took a deep breath to calm down. She was scared because after all, they weren’t going to Caribbean to have a vacation. It was Stiles’ mind who was possessed by an evil fox spirit. “It’s not feeling very specific at the moment.”

“Improvise” Peter responded, shrugging and grimaced but it only showed them he had no idea as well. Which was also not comforting in any way.

“What if this is just another trick?” Scott thoughtfully questioned.

Peter laughed annoyed and frustrated looking at the young alpha. “When are you people going to start trusting me?” he reacted, crossing his arms in front of his chest, and looking at the people around him with a smile.

Scott shook his head no, pointed Stiles with his head. “I meant him” he said, causing Peter to let out an ‘oh’ sound from his lips.

Meanwhile Stella looked at Peter. “Well, if it’s about not trusting you, then I, personally, don’t trust you. Like at all” she said but then sighed in distress and moved her eyebrows. “But right now, your plan is the only plan we have, so there is that.”

Peter grinned; Deaton looked at Scott anxiously. “Scott, we’re running out of time” he reminded. Scott nodded, agreeing with the doctor and all of sudden, Stella found herself in another place, drifting away from the reality. One minute she was sitting on the couch, and the other minute she was tied to a bed in a mental institution right next to Lydia and Scott’s bed and as they all tried to free themselves, Stella felt her heart beats racing and she started breathing deeply.

“I can’t believe you McCall.” Scott stopped struggling and looked at Stella who was looking him in disbelief with wide open eyes. “Do you actually need us to remind you that you’re a freaking werewolf? An Alpha werewolf, I might add?” Stella asked in disbelief.

Scott’s eyes were asking if they were serious. “We’re in Stiles’ head” he said like it was too obvious.

“And you’re a supernatural creature with supernatural strength” Lydia shouted with a low voice, looking at Scott. “Break free!”

Scott nodded, took few deep breathes as he looked at the ceiling. Few minutes later, they were all rubbing their wrists, trying to ease the pressure of the that was tying them up tightly to the bed. Stella and Lydia got up from the bed, they all looked at each other, not sure what their next move was going to bed.

“What now?” Scott asked, looking at them. Stella bit her lip, looking around as she was panting and feeling tired already.

“I don’t know” Lydia murmured, looking at Scott and then added. “This is my first time in someone else’s head.”

Stella found herself grimacing. “I wish I could say the same” she murmured, dropping her hands to her sides, and then knowing how strange the sentence was, she looked at Lydia and Scott, shaking her head. “I’m not even gonna discuss how weird that situation is.” She hit her jeans and sighed. “I’m just not.”

Scott nodded and before he turned around, he parted his lips. “Just stay behind me” he told them and made his way to the door. Stella somehow knew they were in Eichen House. Mainly because of the bed they were tied to. Also, the fact that their voice were echoing.

Stella and Lydia nodded, walking right behind Scott but the minute Scott stepped outside, the door closed shut and Stella found herself falling. So fast and so painful that, she blacked out, still falling.

When Stella opened her brown eyes back, she saw her surroundings behind a glass first. She couldn’t focus, she couldn’t concentrate. For some reason, there was a pain in the back of her head. She blinked few times, gulped down and she meant to hold her head to see if there was something wrong, but she couldn’t move her hands. As her heart picked up its pace, she got anxious by the second and opened her eyes. She could feel the warmth of the blood on her head and when she looked down, she saw that she was tied to a chair.

Even though the room was pretty dark, she could see her black leather jacket was on the floor away from her. Her t-shirt was wrinkled up and there was blood on her pants. She gulped again in confusion. _What the hell is happening,_ she thought _._

Then she heard a voice.

“Rise and shine, sweetheart. Today is training day.” The voice was familiar. Everything about it was just so familiar but it was a voice that she hasn’t heard of in a very long time. It was her mother and that’s what made Stella feel like she was glued to her chair because she couldn’t follow or have any idea about what was happening. She took a deep breath, tried to free herself but failed. She let out a breath from her nose as she heard footsteps coming on her way. Her mother walked in, causing Stella to gasp. She had a smile on. Her long hair was like a fiber of cloud, waving down on her shoulder. She looked so basic but at the same time amazing as always with her leather jacket and skinny jeans and her own smile. “It’s about time you woke up.”

Stella gulped down, looking at her mother with fear. “What the hell?” she murmured, scared, and confused. Then everything came back to her. She remembered she was actually supposed to wear her black jeans instead of her regular jeans and she was definitely not supposed to be wearing her orange shirt and her black leather jacket. When she left the house this morning with Aiden, she was wearing her red shirt on her black jeans. And her mother was definitely supposed to be dead. Stella could remember her funeral so vividly. She’s been to it. Everyone around her told her that she was dead. “You…” She tightened her lips. “You are supposed to be dead.”

Kate smiled again but it was nothing like her smile before. This one was teasing. This one was playful. This one was almost resembled to the smile Nogitsune had as Stiles. “Really Stella? Really?” she asked, walking to the chair Stella was tied to. “Aren’t I looking so alive right now, right before your eyes? Haven’t been all of those hallucinations telling you how alive I am? Come on, sweetheart. You’re smarter than that.”

Stella closed her eyes, shook his head feverishly. “No, no. I…” She gulped down, trying to get rid of the lump. “I went to your funeral” she murmured, refusing to open her eyes. “You are dead.” She tried to pull her hands to herself again, but she was still trapped. And when Stella opened her eyes back, Kate Argent was still there, looking at her daughter with a smile.

“You know…” Kate started pacing around in the messy and old room. “Me and your grandfather have been training you ever since you started walking” she said, crossed her arms in front of her chest as Stella was still trying to get free. But honestly, she wasn’t actually trying. She wanted to hear what that blonde woman had to say. She was that desperate to spend some time with her. She was her mother after all. Kate looked at her. “But of course, you don’t remember any of it.” Stella’s lips fell apart with fear and the emotional pain that took over her body. “Your brain is pretty good at blocking things, isn’t it?” She sarcastically scoffed, turned around on her heels and looked at Stella. “You don’t remember your life here in Beacon Hills even though we’ve lived here for almost 7 years. You don’t have any memories of us together in your brain. You erase them but you desperately want more memories of us to forget. Why are you torturing yourself like that, Stella?”

Stella sighed. Her eyes started to tear up. “It’s not my fault that I don’t remember anything of my time here in Beacon Hills!” she heatedly shouted, almost sobbing. She didn’t believe that. She had no idea why she had no recollection of Beacon Hills even though she lived here till she was 7 and it was annoying, and she hated herself for even blaming herself for it, but she couldn’t help it.

Kate smiled. “Of course not, sweetie” she said but there was something in her voice that didn’t calm Stella down. In fact, it only freaked her out more. “But wouldn’t you want to know why? Because I do know.” She stopped, grinning evilly. Right when she was about to speak again, a voice echoed through Stella’s mind, shaking the place she felt she was in.

“STELLA!” The room shaken up and Stella pulled herself back to the reality. Well, as reality as it could be. She remembered why she was here, and she quickly calmed herself down, looking at her mother.

“Actually, you know what?” She inhaled. Her heart was still pounding but since she knew her purpose now, she was a lot calmer. “When we were in France, after we convinced my uncle to complete our training, he tied me up to a chair like this.” She looked down at the chair, shrugged and looked back at the woman in front of her. “Of course, he chose a metal chair so that we wouldn’t break free from it easily. It took 2 hours for me. It was my first try. Chris said it was impressive.” And then she threw herself back, breaking the wooden chair. She acted quickly, rolled away from the chair, and quickly grabbed her gun that she put inside her boots and aimed at the young woman. “You’re not real.” She looked around and found Kate who had a smile on her face. Stella continued. “And this is not a thought that Stiles used to trap me.” She tilted her head. “It’s not real.”

Kate laughed. “Everyone has it, but no one can lose it” she asked. Stella flinched, paused. It was… Nogitsune. No… It couldn’t be. “What is it Stella?”

“A shadow” Stella answered with a whisper, not being able to control herself. The woman across her smiled one more time and the mirage changed. Her blonde hair faded to a darker color, her blue eyes faded to a brownish color and all of a sudden it wasn’t her mother anymore.

It was herself.

Stella gasped as the evil Stella laughed. “Like I said Stella, I know you were smarter than that” she said. She had straight black hair with black leather jackets. It was the same and the opposite of Stella at the same time. Stella’s heart started to beat faster with fear and the weirdness of the situation. “You were right. You always knew that. But probably because you felt it. Stiles’ mind and his body was not the only Nogitsune possession. Well… We couldn’t take the full control of your body but because of the darkness in your soul, it was only easier for us to get a piece of you back in the hospital, in that dream. Actually… I was able to control you, way before that dream. The times your guard was done, the times you were the most vulnerable…”

Stella gasped, gulped down, and frowned as she thought. “When I was sleeping…” she murmured.

The Void Stella sighed in distress and looked at mainly Good Stella. “I was so happy when we finally got you. Finally, _finally,_ Stella Argent’s soul was in the palm of our hands.” She tightened her lips and looked at the real Stella with a grin. “Since technically I’m a piece of your soul and not completely, well… You… I don’t have much time. You’re gonna kill me, I know it. I would do the same but…” Her smile got more sicker, got more devilish. “Let me return the favor now, okay?”

Before even Stella could do anything, Evil Stella touched Stella’s forehead and Stella felt the air was pulled forcefully out of her lungs. And as the memories came floating like a tsunami, she gasped for air. 

She first found herself in Allison’s room. It was the night where Stiles sleepwalked to the coyote den. Stella walked inside Allison’s room, grabbed her phone on her nightstand and with an evil smile, she turned it off so that no one could reach her. And before she walked outside the room, she looked at Allison who was sleeping safe and sound on her bed.

And then she found herself in the woods with Stiles by her side, but it wasn’t Stiles. It was the Nogitsune. Stella remembered the blackout she had few hours before she went to Aiden for the night. _“Are you sure this is going to work?”_ The Void Stiles was asking as he was looking at The void Stella who was working on the trap that shot the arrow to the Coach that day in the woods. It was her who set the trap.

Then she found herself talking on the phone, sending the bomb to the sheriff station. That’s why she knew there was something wrong. That’s why she knew the bomb wasn’t in the school bus.

The connection she had with the Nogitsune… That’s how she knew Stiles wasn’t at the Eichen that night. That’s how she knew…

Stella gasped, getting to herself and before even she could stop herself, she pulled the trigger on evil Stella and watched the bulled fly to her evil personality, hitting her on the head and falling to the ground with blood coming out of her lips.

She took a deep breath and without letting herself look at the dead body on the ground, she turned around and pushed the doors open. She ran outside, found herself in the white room. She quickly looked around and when she found Scott and Lydia, she quickly ran to them. 

None of them said anything but obviously, they had some rough time in Stiles’ brain. They looked around, looking for Stiles and then Scott focused on the one point. Stiles and Nogitsune were sitting on the Nemeton, playing the game of GO.

Stella sighed. “I guess that’s the weirdest and most interesting game partner ever” she found herself murmuring. Lydia and Scott nodded but then they all started running towards Stiles. But no matter how much they run, they seemed to be stuck in one place. It was almost like they were running on their spots and the Nemeton was just getting further away from them. Stella stopped, remembering her dream and what just happened. She watched Lydia and Scott stop running as well.

And then they started shouting. “Stiles! Stiles! Stiles!”

“Stiles, stiles, over here!” Lydia shouted, waving her hands above her head, trying to get his attention but Stiles couldn’t hear them as he was so focused on the game and then Stella stopped shouting, panting.

With an idea, she started smiling. “Stiles is a part of your pack” she murmured.

“What? What do you mean?” Scott asked between his heavy breathings, he turned his head to look at her.

“He is human but…” She stopped to take a breath as she was tired from all the useless running. But he’s still part of the pack, right?” Scott nodded yes, while Stella pressed her lips together with a smile and looked at the alpha. “So how do wolves signal their location to the rest of the back.”

Scott got the idea. He looked down and when he looked up back again, there were hairs on his cheeks, he got his fangs out and his eyes were glowing with bright red. Nogitsune looked at them like he heard Stella’s plan.

Scott took a breath in. “They howl” he said and with every strength he had, with every fiber of him, he howled loudly. The howl echoed through Stiles, reaching him, and causing him to gasp and look up. Stiles looked at his friends, understood what was happening and he looked back at the Nogitsune. Stiles flipped the board over angrily, causing Nogitsune to roar angrily.

There was a big scream coming out from Stella’s lips and the other second, they were out of Stiles’ mind.

Stella didn’t open her eyes like the rest of them as they were gasping in shock. Melissa quickly ran to Stella, meanwhile Scott headed to Stiles. “Did it work? Did it work?” he asked with a loud voice.

“What happened?” Lydia wondered, her hand on the back of her neck on the spot Scott’s claws went through. She looked at Stiles who was still on the couch with his eyes closed. “Why didn’t it work?” Stella was in the same state. “Why Stella haven’t opened her eyes yet?”

As Lydia was asking questions back to back with worry, Peter grabbed her by the arm. “Because it’s not science Lydia. It’s supernatural” he answered her. “And Stella didn’t take a trip to Stiles’ brain the same way you guys did. You didn’t expect her to be running right away, did you?” He pulled her away from the others, to another empty room. “I did my part. Now give me the name.”

As Lydia remembered her deal with Peter, Scott frowned. He looked at them. “What name? What are you talking about?”

Lydia couldn’t answer him as he was still holding the back of her neck which was still hurting. Peter kept talking. “Lydia, a deal is a deal. Even with me.”

Lydia sighed, knew it was true. She looked at him and then leaned into his ear to whisper his daughter’s name. “Malia.”

And then, Stiles started to grunt, gag. He quickly reached out to the tape on his mouth, got rid of it and started pulling some kind of white fabric. It was the same bandage that Nogitsune had around him like a mummy.

Everyone was looking at this scene, horrified. Because it got scarier, more terrifying. Stella was still out of conscious. Stiles threw himself onto the couch, when the bandages formed up in a shape in a way that no one else wanted to speak of, ever. And something started to grow from the ground between the bandages. It looked like Nogitsune’s true form. 

He couldn’t see anything, he jumped on them. Deaton pulled Lydia and Melissa to himself, trying to protect them. Meanwhile Scott and Peter threw him to the couch that Stella wasn’t on. They grabbed him by the arm, trying to hold him still. “Hold him!” Peter shouted, also terrified, and confused.

“I’m trying!” Scott answered but then he noticed something else. He let out a breath. “Wait! Wait, wait!” As the alpha helped the Nogitsune to get rid of the bandages, Peter was looking at Scott with an expression that said he was crazy but then Stiles… The real Stiles came out of the bandages, scared, and confused.

“Scott?” he murmured with an uneasy voice, looking around. Anyone could see the fear inside those hazel eyes as he was looking around, he was looking at the people he knew. He couldn’t believe he was out, breathing, and he was himself after all those times being stuck in his mind.

Scott sighed but then he heard Deaton. “Scott” he said like he was telling him bad news. Scott looked at him; Deaton pointed the door that was wide open.

Scott looked around. Everyone was there except Lydia and the real Nogitsune. He gasped with the realization. “Where are they?” he asked and then ran outside. “Where are they?”

When Stella opened her eyes slowly, Scott was outside shouting, calling out for Lydia.


	23. INSATIABLE

Stella was sitting on the green couch in Scott’s room while Melissa was checking Stiles up, trying to see if he was really him and if he was okay. And in the meantime, Stella was trying to sit still as the voices in her head went nuts, started hurting her skull physically. There was a word in the middle of the darkness, shinning up in neon colors. She took a deep breath, gave it out anxiously with her heart pumping so loud, combining with the voices in her chest. _Oak Creek._ That was the word. And she couldn’t get rid of the disturbing feeling inside her stomach that made her want to scream her lungs out which only mean one thing.

And that thing was anything but good.

Stella sighed and as her pone buzzed on her lap, distracting her from the voices. She was grateful for that. As she grabbed her phone and looked at the ID and seeing it was Allison, she let out another relieved breath. It meant she was well enough to text her. She’s been worried about her ever since her little annoying conversation with the Void Stiles.

**Ally – Aiden, Ethan and Isaac are okay. Deaton thinks it’s a trick that’s used as a distraction from Stiles. He saved them so everything is okay. I told Aiden that you’re fine, but you may have to talk to him about it. Anything on Stiles?**

Stiles sighed and typed a text back. **Melissa is still checking. I got Aiden and I’m glad they are all okay. I’ll text you the updates, Ally.** She hit send and then looked at Melissa who was done checking Stiles up. Stiles was still laying on the bed, pretty tired and dazed. There were still bad circles under his eyes. “Well… Medically, you seem okay” she announced, placing his arm back on his stomach. She cracked a soft smile as Stella tightened her lips and stood up from the couch. She walked towards the bed. Melissa continued as she chuckled nervously. “You’re definitely a real person.”

“Okay, so I’m real, but am I really me?” Stiles asked the one-billion-dollar worth question. Stella’s been looking at Stiles worriedly when Scott appeared in front of the door fast and anxious.

Stella quickly looked at the Alpha. “Is she here?” she asked curiously. They had this weird and totally dangerous plan on how to find out if Stiles was the actual Stiles. They asked Noshiko, Kira’s mom’s help. Which only meant that Stella had to see one of things that she hated the most. The Onis.

“Yeah” Scott said, nodding.

Stiles straightened up on the bed, and as he got up, he looked at his friends. “Okay, let’s do this.” Melissa, Scott, and Stella looked at each other, not being sure. Stiles knew the meaning of all. He quickly played defense. He sighed as he parted his lips. “Guys, we have to do this.”

Scott and Stella nodded. They grabbed him by the arm, helping him stand and guided him to downstairs, to the living room. Mrs. Yukimura was standing in the middle of the room, alone. Stella suddenly remembered that she was actually 900-year-old and felt a little weird. “Do you recognize me?” she asked as she saw the young man walking towards her. Stiles turned to look at Scott and Stella to tell them it was okay. When he looked back at the woman, the door opened, and, in Stella’s terms, the little fox speedily walked in.

“Stop!” she shouted, walking towards them.

“It’s okay” Stiles murmured with his husky voice. He was still tired and exhausted. That’s why his voice was coming out cracked. “I’m the one who asked her to come.”

“You’re the one who’s going to get stabbed with swords” Kira objected heatedly, looking at Stiles.

Hearing that, Stella crossed her arms in front of her, looking at Kira with a straight but firm expression. “And if that happens, I’m the one who’s going to be ready” she said strictly. She had her sword by her side. Ever since she realized guns were not working on those onis, she’s been carrying a sword like them and Kira’s.

Kira turned to look at her mother. “Mom, don’t do this to him” she begged, not caring what Stella has said. Actually, she had no beef with Stella the way Stella had her with her. She thought Stella was a great person in heart and after all, she had a crush on Scott who used to date Allison who was Stella’s cousin. She had every right be protective. Kira just didn’t think anyone could defeat the onis.

“It’s already done” Noshiko said and then two shadows appeared right behind Stiles, causing Stella to startle as Scott grabbed her by the arm and pulled away from Stiles to protect her. In the meantime, Stiles turned around, looked at the ninjas. One of the onis held Stiles from behind like they did to rest of them, and the other held Stiles’ ear. Everyone held their breath as they waited for them to either mark Stiles or kill him.

 _Preferably mark him_ , Stella thought.

But then, Stiles fell to the ground and the onis disappeared. Seeing that, Stella quickly ran to Stiles to check behind his ear. She sighed in relief as she saw the backwards 5 and then looked at Scott over her shoulder. “It worked” she announced. As Melissa, Kira and Scott felt the same relief, Stella’s hands moved on Stiles’ back showing support.

“So, I’m actually me?” Stiles asked, tried to get up. Stella quickly helped him with a soft and comforting smile, happy that her best friend was really her best friend and not a homicidal and psychopath, sociopath fox spirit.

“More you than the Nogitsune” Mrs. Yukimura responded with a soft smile.

Stiles looked at the 900-year-old woman. “Can the oni find him?” he questioned, worried about Lydia.

“Tomorrow night, probably” Stella answered instead of Mrs. Yukimura. As she pointed the windows to show them the light coming through, she saw Noshiko nodding from the corner of her eyes. “It’s too close to dawn now.”

Stiles whispered a silent curse and then looked at them again. “Can they kill him?” he asked, feeling exhausted. He needed a good sleep… Hell, he needed more than just a one good sleep, but they still had a lot to do before a well-deserved rest.

“It depends on how strong he is” Mrs. Yukimura answered and turned around to leave them alone, but Scott’s voice echoed in the living room.

“What about Lydia?” Scott shouted, stopping the woman on the mid-way through, and making her turn to them again. “Why would he take her?”

“He would only take her for an advantage” Mrs. Yukimura explained.

Stella frowned. “You mean her power?”

Noshiko nodded, confirming her. “The power of a banshee” she said.

This time Stiles frowned, confused. “Stella’s a banshee, too?” he said but it came out more like a question. “I mean at least that’s what Jennifer said, right?”

“It’s true that she is a banshee but…” Mrs. Yukimura’s eyes found Stella and for a split second, Stella thought she knew what was happening. It felt like she knew why the Nogitsune took Lydia instead of Stella when it was a lot easier for him to take Stella when she was unconscious. “Her powers are working a lot differently than Lydia’s” she continued. “Nogitsune knows what he wants… What he exactly wants…” Stella pressed her lips together, nodding. _He doesn’t have to take me anyway,_ she thought but didn’t say it out loud. Blinked few times, hearing the voices loud and clear. She knew where Lydia was. She could hear the voices even from Scott’s house.

And as she closed her eyes shut, Lydia’s banshee scream echoed inside her brain.

“Hey, you okay?” Scott asked, looking at the young Argent. Stella was biting her lower lip as she was looking outside from the windows. Scott kept driving the car; Stella she nodded yes to him, but he didn’t believe her one bit. “Stella.” Young Argent looked at the alpha with a ‘hmm’ sound from her lips. Scott continued. “What happened back there? You didn’t tell us what you saw in Stiles’ mind when we got dragged away. Is this about that?”

Stella sighed as she watched Scott park the car. Stiles was looking at Stella worried, knowing everything since it was all in his head. “What could I possible see there?” Stella responded, getting ready to joke it off. “His memories with his dad, his jeep and obviously, unforgettable one…” she listed and looked at Stiles and Scott with a soft smile that she faked as they climbed out of the car. “Lydia.”

Stiles decided not to say anything as they all walked inside the station. Even Stella could feel Stiles’ anxiety as they were getting closer to his dad’s office and then they heard him, talking to Parrish but it was from a distance and Stella couldn’t catch the words. As they got closer and finally stood right outside his office, his voice became more audible. “Ah, if I could just find my keys” Sheriff murmured as he was looking for his keys so that he could get out.

Stiles was playing with his fingers nervously. “In your coffee cup” he suddenly said with a soft murmur. Sheriff quickly turned to their direction and saw his son. Stiles pointed Sheriff’s desk nervously with his index finger. “You always drop them in your empty cup.” Sheriff’s suspicious but hopeful eyes found Scott and Stella asking if he was real. They nodded. Sheriff ran to his boy, pulled him into a very tight hug. Stella sighed as she watched the Stilinski boys reunite and hug. “Hey, Dad.”

 _One problem down. Big problem to go_ , Stella thought as she watched them. Then she walked up to Sheriff’s desk, grabbed the keys from the empty coffee cup just like Stiles said where they were. “Is it over?” she heard Sheriff saying.

“Not yet” Scott answered.

Stella looked at the keys inside her palm, turned to sheriff and smiled. “We just have to deal with a rabid fox spirit that wants to kill us all” she sarcastically commented and then tossed the keys to the sheriff. She continued as she watched him catch the keys. “You gotta protect your home no matter what, right?”

“We got an APB out on Lydia’s car” Sheriff informed them, opening the door and walking inside his office. Scott was standing near the desk with his arms crossed in front of his chest. Stiles was leaning against the desk, looking at his father and Stella was leaning against the wall. Her anxiety was off the charts and she just felt like she was drowning but she couldn’t show that to anyone as the Sheriff kept talking. “Every unit on the road is looking for her.”

“Isn’t there anything else that we could do?” Scott asked curiously, looking at Sheriff. Stella moved on her spot nervously, not knowing what to do and it was driving her nuts.

“At this hour?” Sheriff shook his head. “No, not really.”

“He took her for a reason, dad” Stiles interrupted as he was looking at his father. “He could’ve taken Stella, but he took Lydia. And if we can figure out the why, then we’ll figure out the where.”

“Okay” Sheriff said before he turned around and checked the door. He looked at them with a frown in confusion. “Why would a Nogitsune need with a Banshee?”

“I don’t know, Lydia’s pretty good at finding dead bodies” Stiles responded to his father. “Maybe he needs to find a body?”

Stella grimaced, looking at Stiles. “He’s the one creating the dead bodies” she said. “Why the hell would he be trying to find a body?”

Sheriff looked at Scott. “Scott, you know more about this than all of us” he told to him, crossing his arms in front of his chest. Stella looked at Scott as well, agreeing with Sheriff but Scott was surprised and confused as he was pointing himself. “You said you got the whole story from Noshiko?”

Scott nodded. “Yeah, but that happened during World War II” he responded, slightly shaking his head. “Like 70 years ago.”

Listening Scott, Stiles noticed something. He frowned, looked at his best friend. “Wait” he said, stopping him, causing him to turn his head and look at him. “What did you say?”

“Noshiko told me about the internment camp…” he started explaining but Stiles interrupted him, straightening up placing his hands on the desk.

“No, before that” he said nervously but keeping his volume down. “You said the whole story.”

“Yeah” Scott nodded. “What is it?”

Stiles started to think. Stella could see that. Young Stilinski went back to his time at Eichen House, he remembered that weird girl who talked to phone when there was no line. “There’s a girl at Eichen House” Stiles explained with everyone looking at him. “Her name’s Meredith.” He looked up at his friends and his dad. He continued. “I think she might be able to help.”

“Sheriff, Meredith Walker” Parrish announced as he walked up to them.

“She’s still there?” Sheriff asked, turning towards him, and looking at him. Stella had to leave early to meet with Allison to help her and Isaac out as they were all trying to find Lydia so there were only Stiles, Scott, and the Sheriff for the moment. And now Parrish who was telling them the things he learned over the phone with Eichen House.

“Yeah, but they moved her to the Closed Unit” Parrish answered.

Stiles frowned. “Why?” he wondered.

Parrish looked at Stiles. “They said behavioral issues” he responded. He looked at Scott and Stiles. “She wouldn’t stop screaming.”

And in that moment as Stiles and Scott looked at each other, they knew, and they were sure that Meredith could help them.

Few hours later, Allison and Stella were in storage where they were keeping the broken and useless guns, trying to kill time, fixing their weapons. Stella sighed in distress. She spent the whole day with Scott and Stiles as they were looking after him and trying to find Meredith until Stella left them with the Sheriff to meet up with Allison to find a meaning to the message she left on the car. The message told them not to look for her and meanwhile, Ethan and Aiden were still trying to find Lydia. Isaac was supposed to meet with Stiles and Scott and for the moment, there was nothing else to do. Which only meant free time and in times like this, Stella and Allison hated this with every fiber on their body.

It just wasn’t for them.

That’s why they were in the basement, trying to fix up some guns and things. They thought they would need them since they were in a battle with a fox spirit. Stella was repairing Chris’ gun as she promised, and Allison was taking care of her crossbow.

That’s when Chris walked in. He smiled as he looked at his daughter and his niece. “I had a feeling, you girls might be down here” he said, stood right next to them. He was happy to finally see Stella with them because like everybody else, he noticed she was avoiding them, pushing them away. And when Allison told him why, causing him to think about the conversation he had with Derek in prison. And he understood. But Chris, he loved Stella no matter what. She was like his own daughter.

“We needed to do something” Allison explained, still looking at her crossbow. She sighed as she was talking for both of them. “We hate waiting.”

Stella took a deep breath and grabbed the gun that she fixed. “It makes you feel useless” she murmured and handed the gun back to her uncle. “At least I finally had the time to fix this.”

Chris smiled, took the gun from her hands, and then turned to look at his daughter. “Where’s Isaac?” he asked curiously.

“He’s trying to help Scott” Allison answered, focused on her crossbow.

Chris looked at Stella. “What about Aiden?”

“With Ethan” Stella said, sighed. “They’re still trying to find Lydia.”

“They’re all trying to be useful?” Chris asked. Both of the girls nodded. Allison grabbed a screwdriver and tried to use it but since she was too nervous, she couldn’t do what she was trying to do. That’s when Chris first put the gun back onto the table and held Allison’s hand causing her to look at her father. “Leave them for now, huh?” Chris looked at Stella and then walked away from them. Allison put the tool back on the table while Chris kneeled in front of a drawer that was put against the fences. “I have something else you girls can do. Something we should’ve done a while ago.” Stella and Allison looked at Chris with a confused frown while he was grabbing two grey cases. He pulled the locked cases to their level, put them on the table for them to see. With his both hands opened them, showing the girls what was inside. Stella and Allison leaned in, only to see the silver rectangle materials that had the symbol of a fleur-de-lis carving on the middle of them. It was the thing the Argents would do to make their own silver bullets as a ceremony. “It’s time for you to graduate.” 

Stella looked at her uncle’s face in shock with wide open eyes as she understood the meaning behind this graduation. Every insecurity of hers came back and conflicted with everything else in her mind. She parted her shaky lips, not knowing what to say. “I…” she started but Chris shut her up.

“You can be a banshee or anything else, Stella” Argent started, looking at his niece. She grabbed one from the suitcase, put it inside her palm and covered it with her fingers. “You’re always going to be an Argent.”

Stella smiled, nodding. And then Chris started telling them the process. How they were going to do it and what should they do… After getting the hang of it, Stella grabbed her tools and went upstairs to her room. She needed a much larger environment to make her silver bullets and because of the anxiety she’s been feeling and the voices inside her brain, the basement was only causing her to feel anxious more.

She sighed, placed the case on her desk and as she got to it, she tried to block the voices away.

“Remember, you can start over” Chris assured his daughter as Allison got ready to put the melted silver to her mold. He sat down on the chair Stella was sitting on before she went upstairs to catch a breather. “I was a bit of a perfectionist about it myself. I always wanted the seal to look just right.” He pulled up a bullet out of his pocket.

“How many did you make?” Allison asked, looking at the bullet her dad was holding between his fingers.

“Six” Chris answered with a proud smile. “But I used them all. Only at close range, though. Despite some other legends…” He put the bullet down on the table, looked at his daughter. He continued. “Silver’s not really as accurate as lead.” Chris put his hand on his daughter’s shoulder as he got ready to leave her alone, but he stopped before he could leave the room as he heard Allison.

“Dad, wait” she said, frowned. “I think I should use my own mold.”

Chris frowned, turned to his daughter. “You have a bullet mold?” he asked curiously.

“No, not a bullet” Allison replied. “An arrowhead.” She paused for a while, looked at her father and continued. “The bow is my weapon. So, I should make a silver arrowhead.” Chris smiled, placed a kiss on the top of his daughter’s head. Then Allison started speaking again. She also had a disturbing feeling in her stomach. She was thinking a lot of things but the one that was standing out was her mother. Graduating, finally being able to create her own silver bullet made her think about her family and how much she missed her mother. “Dad… If something happens…” Allison’s eyes looked down at her hands, feeling overwhelmed with emotions.

“Hey, hey” he said, getting her to look at him. He had a soft voice as he was trying to calm his daughter down. “You don’t need to worry about me.”

“Well, yeah. I didn’t get to say anything to mom” Allison reminded, looking at her father.

“You didn’t need to say anything” Chris said, looking at his daughter with so much love. “And me and Stella are going to be around a long time. I promise.”

“Well, then take it as a reminder” Allison insisted, determined to say the things in her mind out loud. She had to. “Maybe you don’t need to hear it, but I need to know that I said it.” She paused, gulped down, and added a soft smile on her beautiful face as her brown eyes looked up at her dad. “I love you. I’m proud of you. I’m proud of us.” She stopped again, pressed her lips together as she was trying to hold back the tears but then she continued. “And I know Stella never said this, but I know she loves you and she is so proud of you.” Chris smiled, kissed his daughter on the head again and headed for the door to check up on Stella but all of a sudden, he heard Allison again. “And dad…” Chris stopped walking, turned around to look at Allison. There was something in her eyes. He frowned in confusion. “I know about Stella.”

Chris got more confused. He tilted his head, looking at Allison. “What do you mean?” he asked.

Allison took a deep breath. “I know that Derek is her father and I want to be the one who tells her when it’s time” she explained. “I lied to her so many times that she deserves to hear this from me.” Chris stopped, thought about it without saying anything for a second and then nodded.

As Allison got back to work, Chris made his way upstairs with so many thoughts running around on his mind.

“Stella?” As she heard her uncle’s voice, she poured the last bits of melted silver into her mold and turned her head to the door. She watched Chris walk towards her and sit right next to her. Chris looked down at what she’s been doing. All of her molds were already filled up and looking good. “Hmm.” His eyes found Stella. “Are you making bullets?”

Stella nodded with sigh. “I can guess Allison’s been doing arrowheads since bow is her weapon and I’m usually using a gun, so…” she murmured as she filled up the last mold. Chris nodded, sitting on the empty chair next to Stella who finished up and turned to her uncle as her anxiety kept rising up inside. “I’m sorry” she suddenly murmured, confusing Chris. “I… I’ve been looking ways to push you away, and ignore you or… I don’t know. I did that. And I’m sorry. And I…” Stella stopped before she said too much. She used the phrase ‘I love you’ only to her cousin. Only to her. She knew she loved Chris deep down and it would kill her to see something happened to him, but she couldn’t have the strength in her to say these words to him. She just couldn’t… She gulped down and continued. There was a smile on Chris’ face. He knew everything even though Stella didn’t tell him. “I know I don’t say that a lot but thank you. Thank you for everything.”

Chris placed his hand on her hair, placed a kiss on the top of her head and smile as he pulled away, felt like he was looking at his daughter. “I’ll leave you alone” he said, standing up and leaving her alone to go meet with Derek.

Stella sighed, watched him leave and then as she left the bullets to dry, she stood up with a tight feeling around her heart and in her stomach. 

“Coup de foudre” Meredith said as Scott and Stella were walking up the stairs to his room. After finding Meredith at the school, Stiles, Isaac, and Kira brought her here… To Scott’s house to get her help as they were all trying to find where Lydia was.

As Stella took the last step, she found herself thinking. After Chris left the building, she got out of the house as well. She drove to Scott’s house, meeting him downstairs as Rafael was leaving the property. The reason why Stella went there, leaving Allison behind, was that she knew they got something. But at the same time, she knew Lydia didn’t want to be found but 5 against 1 wasn’t effective. Which meant, Stella had to be there to protect them.

“Coup de what? What is that? Spanish?” Stiles questioned, not understanding.

Meanwhile Stella and Scott walked inside. “Actually, it’s French” she corrected him. Meredith, Stiles, and Isaac turned their heads to look at Stella who was standing in front of the door with Scott who quickly grabbed his phone and called Allison. From Noshiko’s story, he knew where Nogitsune took Lydia.

Allison picked up few seconds later. “Scott?” she asked, trying to understand what’s going on.

Scott quickly answered. “We know where Lydia is.”

Chris helped Derek carry the wounded twins to Derek’s loft and placed them on the couch, causing them to grunt in pain due to the movement. Aiden put his hand on one of the wounds on his body as he moaned through the pain. Chris kept looking at them with a frown. According to Derek, they were both looking for Lydia in the woods when they got attacked and Derek ran to help them.

Hale shook his head at Argent, telling him to follow him. They walked few steps away from the twins, leaving them in pain on the couch. As they stopped, Derek reached out to something in his pocket and showed the shell to Chris. “I found these on the ground” he started. That was one of the reasons why Derek called him. He thought maybe he knew who it belonged to since it was apparently a hunter.

“This wasn’t Araya, was it?” Chris asked as he was thinking about their little conversation few days back. He felt like she was building a case against Stella, she was digging something. Maybe she was planning to go after the people Stella cared about but that wasn’t what Araya would do.

“I don’t think so” Derek answered, handed the shell to Chris and as he took it from his hands, Derek continued. “They don’t look like her shells.”

Chris looked at the top of the shell. As he knew this was a tradition between the hunter families who had a system like the Argents and the Calaveras, he looked at the symbol to find out who it was belonged to.

Argent’s eyes opened widely as he saw the symbol, couldn’t believe what his eyes. He gripped tight the shell, closing the symbol with his thumb. “That’s not possible” he murmured, confusing Derek but before even he could ask what the hell he was thinking, Chris’s phone started vibrating in his pocket. Argent picked up the call, seeing it was his daughter. “Allison?” he asked, still thinking about the shell.

“They found her” Allison informed him the minute Chris picked up the phone. She was talking quickly, like she had no time left as she was getting ready to leave the apartment. “Scott found her, dad. They found Lydia. Stella is with them, and I’m on my way now.”

“Allison, hold on” Chris said louder and worried. “You have to wait. Call Stella and wait for me!” 

“I can’t dad!” she responded in hurry. “We can’t!”

She hung the bag on her shoulder and made her way out of the apartment as his dad started to speak. “Allison, wait for me-”

“There’s no time” Allison said. “It’s already night. There’s no time, dad.”

“Wait, Allison, wait!”

But it was too late.

“Hey, you okay?” Hearing Stiles’ voice, Stella stopped looking outside as she was riding on the passenger seat in Stiles’ jeep and looked at him. He was driving the car and Scott was in the back with Isaac as they were headed to Oak Creek.

Yes, Stella knew where she was all this time and the only reason why she never told this to them was that she also knew Lydia didn’t want to be found and the voices that kept telling her someone was going to die. They were getting louder and clearer by the second but still not making any sense as the emptiness inside her stomach got bigger.

She knew something was way wrong and her anxiety was not taking it well.

“Yeah” Stella murmured, resting her head back on her seat. She took a deep breath, kept her eyes on the road through the wind shield. “You don’t have to worry about me.”

“Alright, I’ll say it” Isaac joined the conversation, sitting in the back. Stella let out a breath between her parted lips as she was saying _‘here we go again’_ on Isaac’s attitude. She rested her head back, looking at the ceiling of the car as Isaac continued, looking at Stiles. “You look like you’re dying. You’re pale, thin, and you look like you’re getting worse.” Scott was looking at Isaac in disbelief as Stella sighed and rolled her eyes. “And we’re all sitting here thinking it. And, of course, you have to give a more damn about Stella’s opinion since she is the banshee here.” He paused and took a deep breath before he continued. “But the real question is this… When we find the other you… Is he gonna look like he’s getting better?”

“What happens if he gets hurt?” Scott questioned, wondering. Stella pressed her lips together, deciding to keep her silent because she didn’t know the answer.

“You mean if he dies, do I die? Is that what you’re trying to say?” Stiles looked at Scott from the rear view and continued. “I don’t care. Just so long as no one else dies because of me. I remember everything I did, Scott.” Stiles’ eyes moved to Stella for a second when she was looking down at her hands, thinking about the things she has done as a Nogitsune. Stiles looked back at Scott. “I remember pushing that sword into you. I remember twisting it.”

“It wasn’t you” Stella said, wanting to believe it for herself as well.

“Yeah, but I remember” Stiles insisted. “Don’t you remember the coach, the deputy at the station? It wasn’t you doing that; It wasn’t your fault either, but I know you’re blaming yourself for it.” Stella didn’t have anything to say even when Isaac and Scott knew about everything since she had to tell them. Because they didn’t know what they were running to and even though she was able to kill the Evil Stella, she didn’t wanna take her chances. Stiles sighed, looked at his friends as he was driving. “You guys gotta promise me. You can’t let anyone else get hurt because of me.”

Six teenagers… They were all standing in front of the gates of Oak Creek. It was open, not locked. Stella was a nervous wreck, more than the rest of them because of the noises and the disturbing feeling in her stomach. She wanted to save Lydia but… There was something and all she wanted to do was scream and she gripped the sword she was holding, a lot tighter.

“We’ve done this before, guys” Scott started his pep-talk, looking at his friends. Stella gulped down nervously; she could feel her heart pounding. “A couple of weeks ago we were standing around just like this and we saved Malia, remember?” Allison nodded, confirming the young man. “That was a total stranger. This is Lydia.”

“I’m here to save my best friend” Allison said confidently, looking at her friends around her.

“I came to save mine” Scott added, looking at Stiles.

Isaac just shrugged. “I just didn’t feel like doing any homework.”

Stella rolled her eyes at Isaac, but she just looked around. “And I still think we shouldn’t be here” she said louder than she intended to. “Lydia said it herself and through Meredith that she doesn’t want to be found.” She looked at Allison. “I want to save her. I do. I really do.” She shook her head; her eyes moved on her friends. “I just have a very bad feeling about this.”

Allison looked at her cousin as she was trying to calm her down. “It’s gonna be okay” she assured her, believing in their plan. “Just stay where I can see you, alright?”

Stella sighed but she had nothing to do but nod yes to her cousin and then they took a step forward towards the Oak Creek, Stiles and Scott quickly headed for the building which was used to be an internment camp. They were going to find Lydia while the others were going to stay outside in the yard to fight.

“Kira” Noshiko’s voice reached to them after they saw her. There were two onis behind her as she was walking towards them. Stella wondered where the three of them went as Noshiko continued speaking. “Turn around and go home. Take your friends with you.”

Allison grabbed an arrow and put it on her bow, getting ready for the fight while Kira parted her lips to respond to her mother. “I can’t” she said. “When I looked at the game, I realized who I was actually playing. You.”

Stella pulled her sword up, getting in position while Allison stretched the bow, aiming at Kira’s mom as she was threatening her with her weapon and her body language. She was here to save her best friend and she wasn’t going to let anyone stop her. “Call them off” she firmly ordered. 

“You think you could take him alive?” Noshiko questioned as she was looking directly at the two Argents. She really didn’t believe they could. “You think you can save him?”

“What if we can?” Kira asked, looking at her mother. Stella could feel the anger and the anxiety rising inside her fast.

“I tried something like it 70 years ago” Noshiko reminded them. “Your friend is gone.”

Stella scoffed, annoyed and frustrated. “You sure about that?” she asked.

“Or if Stiles doesn’t have to die?” Kira continued, getting closer to her mother with every word. She took a breath, looking at her mother. “Maybe Rhys didn’t have to die either?”

And then suddenly the Onis got into their battle position, causing Stella to pull her sword up more in a threatening way. Meanwhile Noshiko was still determined. She was looking at her daughter. “I see I’m no longer the Fox now, Kira” she said, smiling. “You are. Bu the Nogitsune is still my demon to bury.”

But then before even they attack each other the onis disappeared into grey smokes but the way Noshiko reacted to it showed them something was wrong; it wasn’t her doing.

Noshiko looked down at her hand, shocked as she noticed the dead firefly. Allison and Stella looked at each other with confusion as they felt a little bit scared. Isaac kept his gaze on Kira’s mother. “What is that?” he asked, sending death glares to Noshiko. “What does that mean!?”

“It means there’s been a change in ownership.” As the Nogitsune’s voice reached to them, they quickly turned around to see him standing there with 5 of the Onis standing behind him. Stella gasped in fear. “Now they belong to me.”

Allison quickly aimed again. Stella and Kira took their positions with their swords and as the Onis did the same, Dark Stiles had an evil grin on his pale face.

Allison was shooting arrows from a distance as the rest of them were right in the battle with their swords and their claws. The swords were hitting each other, the metal sound was echoing through the air as Stella dodged a sword swing coming from an oni. She ducked and swung her sword back, but the other attack made her sword fall to the ground. The oni didn’t stop, Stella ducked again and seeing that, Isaac quickly ran to her help.

As the fight got more violent and got longer, the anxiety Stella’s been feeling got bigger and the voices got louder. She could feel the banshee scream rising inside her, wanting to be set free but she held herself. Isaac kept fighting with the oni hand to sword far away from Stella who she slid on the ground to her sword. She had to push those feelings away. She had to be sharp and ready and deathly against the ninjas.

She grabbed her sword and at the last minute, she stopped a oni attack from cutting her head off. Their swords hit each other as Stella blocked the attack with the clanking sound. She rolled to her side, quickly got up and kept fighting as she caused onis sword to fly away from it. 

“How do we stop them?” Isaac shouted, asking as he was still fighting with the onis. Stella saw Kira, fighting with two of them and ran to her help as Noshiko’s answer reached to their ears. It was hard to hear through all the metals hitting each other, roaring, and fighting but they did, and they didn’t like the answer.

“You can’t!” Kira’s mother shouted.

Stella gulped down, blocked another sword, and kicked the oni, causing it to fall. She stopped to catch a breath when she saw one of the onis cut Isaac, making him bleed. She gasped; her heart pounding. She looked at Kira through her heavy breaths to see if she needed her help, but seeing her doing just fine with all the sword swinging, she decided to help Isaac out instead.

But then one of them cut her path, blocking her from getting to Isaac and help him. Stella couldn’t help but roll her eyes as she blocked the attack. “I’m seriously missing my time in France” she murmured as she started fighting with that oni. She swung her sword. “French food.” She swung her sword again, blocking oni’s attack. “French guys.” She ducked to dodge the oni’s sword, rolled her eyes. “And definitely…” She swung her sword again. “… no onis.” 

She could see three of them were slashing Isaac, not killing him but hurting him enough to not let him fight back or heal from the corner of her eyes but she couldn’t do anything about it as the oni kept attacking her.

Allison grabbed another arrow, put it on the bow and let it fly. The arrow met the oni but then something happened that no one else expected. From the corner of her eyes, Stella saw the oni in black blew up with a yellow dust and a black smoke around it, causing Isaac to finally catch a breath as it was easier for him to fight off two onis now. That was when Stella knocked out her oni and made her way to Isaac.

But then her feet got stuck on the ground when she saw what happened only few steps away from her. Something that made her feel like someone just crushed her heart.

“ALLISON!” In that moment she had no idea who screamed. It could be her. It could be someone else. All she knew that she couldn’t move a single muscle on her body as her eyes were locked on Allison, watching her as one of the onis pushed a sword into her stomach. Allison’s bow fell to the ground. The sound of it echoed and rang through Stella’s ears as her lips fell apart, tears forming in her brown eyes. Her hands started to shake. Because of the scream that got out between her lips, her throat was hurting. Her lips were cracked. She felt cold. She felt numb. Her eyes, her throat… Everything in her body was burning with grief as she watched Allison fall into Scott’s lap. She didn’t even notice the way the other onis disappeared through a smoke. She felt her heart pounding in her chest, the breath stuck in her lungs and her saddened teary eyes were locked on Allison.

Stella felt like everything stopped around her. It was dead silent. She didn’t heart the wind; she didn’t hear her friend’s heavy breathes as they all were in shock. All she could heart was Allison barely breathing. All could do was watch Scott run to Allison in slow motion, grabbing her into his arms even in slower motion.

She stumbled, losing her balance as her lips started shaking. She didn’t notice Kira in the corner with her mother. She didn’t notice when Isaac quickly got up from the ground and ran towards Stella and grabbed her before she fell on her knees. She didn’t notice the way his heart was beating against her back with grief as he held her close. She didn’t know how Isaac was holding her, tears in his eyes as he was also looking at Allison’s body between Scott’s arms. In that moment, Stella didn’t know anything. Nothing. The only thing her body could do was relive the last Argent Girls Day only few days ago, relive their last memory together in her mind, relive their best moments, torturing Stella even more.

As she held onto Isaac’s arms, not even being able to stand on her own, a moment from their last conversation sneaked into her mind, making her feel like someone was squeezing her heart with their hand. It was painful.

_**** “We’ll be graduating next year” Allison reminded with a smile as she reached out to another bag of Cheetos, opening it up. Her joyful and soft brown gaze moved to her cousin, showing her the dimples on her cheeks because of how big she was smiling. She couldn’t remember another moment in a long time that she was truly happy, being just with her cousin Stella on the rooftop. Just the two of them and nothing else… Just like old times… “Do you know what you want to do after graduation?”_

_“Not really” Stella answered, shrugging. She sat on the roof cross-legged as she was looking at the amazing view in front of them. It wasn’t like at the watchout point but it was still something beautiful. Something magical… “All I know is that I don’t wanna see that school ever again.” The girls scoffed softly as Stella continued. “Although, I made some great friends in it. School still sucks.”_

_Allison giggled, wrapped her arms around her legs and placed her chin on her knees as she kept looking at Stella. “I’d like to travel the world” she said, confident about what she wanted. She placed her cheek on her knees. “We’ve seen most of America but I never actually get to see the world, you know, see places that no one else would like to see.” She smiled. “I’ve always wondered about Mexico. Spain. Italy.”_

_Stella laughed. “Yeah those three are kind of popular, you might want to update your list” she teased, causing Allison to laugh, and hit her on the shoulder slowly. Stella smiled, slightly and softly nodded. “Yeah” she whispered, looking at her cousin. “I think… I think traveling the world with you would be great. I mean… I’ve been to Mexico. Not a great fan but if you’re with me then… I think it would be amazing.”_

_Allison jokingly smiled with a frown. “When did you go to Mexico?” she questioned curiously._

_Stella laughed. “I went there with a friend to get drunk, Allison, so I don’t remember much of it but I think…” She teasingly huffed, trying to remember that night but due to alcohol, it was just a blank. Allison amusingly rolled her eyes as she continued. “I don’t know, it was probably on my 16 th birthday.” Allison smiled and then pulled her into a hug. Stella rested her head on her shoulder, took a deep breath and started to speak again. “I’m sorry for ever pushing you away. I’ve been missing you a lot but I just…” Stella paused to find the right words but there were none. She sighed, her eyes on the view. “I don’t know. All I know is that I don’t ever want to lose you. You are my sister, my family… and I love you Allison.”_

_Allison smiled, rested her cheek on her hair. She was looking at the view in front of them as well as she softly parted her lips. “I love you, too, Stella” she lovingly murmured. “Besides… I’m not leaving you alone just yet, so you better not get tired of me.”_

_Stella laughed, knowing it was impossible. ****_

Stella felt like her whole body was losing the battle against the gravity, feeling the weight around her heart. The only thing that was keeping her on her feet, carrying her was Isaac’s buffed arms around her body as she got lost between her memories with Allison, watching her last moments. Tears streamed down on her face as she held onto Isaac’s arms, sobbing really hard. Her heart was pounding with grief really fast inside her chest. Her whole body was shaking with the shock.

And then as the salt in the wound, she heard Scott’s cracked voice that was heartbreaking. His brown eyes, full of tears, were locked on the young girl between his hands, sitting on the ground, listening to her fast yet tired heart beats. “Allison” he managed to murmur, still in shock.

Allison’s hand was on her wound, covered in blood as she was looking at Scott, hearing him. She tried to take a breath but it was getting hard for her by the second. “Did you find her?” she barely managed to ask, talking fast but hardly through her shallow breaths. Her voice was weak, using every strength in her to get the words out loud from her lips. “Is she okay? Is Lydia safe?”

Stella was looking at them, putting all of her weight on Isaac. She was seeing them, but her brain was not processing any of the things that was happening right in front of her eyes. Allison was a trained huntress. She couldn’t go out like that. She had to fight more. She had to fight. They found Lydia. They saved Lydia and Allison had to be there in their last battle against the Nogitsune.

She just had to.

“She’s okay” Scott responded, brushing her hair back softly with his shaky hands. And then he moved his fingers to Allison’s almost pale and weak but still soft hands but when he couldn’t do what he wanted to do; his teary brown doe eyes found Allison. He gasped in shock. “I can’t… I can’t take your pain.”

Stella let out a heart crushing sob between her lips, tears falling down from her eyes, losing the control of her feet. The gravity, the grief and the pain inside her heart, the fear of losing Allison was just too strong for her to fight back for her, pulling the young Argent down to the ground with no mercy. Isaac kept holding her up, knowing the pain she was in, feeling it himself. He held her closer to his body, tightening his arms around her so that she wouldn’t fall on her knees. He heard her soft barely audible whispers to herself. _No, no, no, no, no, no, no…._ She kept murmuring this to herself, begging God or anything that was up there that it was just a nightmare and she had to wake up.

But she never did. Because it wasn’t a nightmare in a dream. It was a nightmare in her reality that she wasn’t strong enough to face.

“It’s because it doesn’t hurt” Allison told him, assured him with a smile. She was looking at him right in his brown eyes, smiling to comfort him when she was the one who was hurt. “It’s okay.”

“Allison” Scott sobbed, murmuring her name. He couldn’t even describe the pain that he was in right now. He couldn’t see Stella shaking between Isaac’s arms, her brain shutting down itself with the pain. He couldn’t notice Isaac crying, holding Stella. He had no idea where Kira or Noshiko was. He didn’t know where Lydia and Stiles were, how they were. Where was the onis and the Nogitsune… In that moment, as he looked at her, the first person he has ever loved… Everything else just seemed pointless. In that moment, he would do everything to save her but the worst part was that…

He knew there was nothing he could do to help her.

“It’s okay. It’s okay” Allison cried, looking at Scott with so much love in her eyes. The way she was trying to comfort him… It was almost like she knew what was in his mind, what was he thinking about. “It’s okay. It’s perfect. I’m in the arms of my first love.” A tear slipped down from her eyes, looking into those brown eyes that she loved so much. “The first person I’ve ever loved. The person I’ll always love.” Stella silently sobbed, cried between Isaac’s arms as she held tighter to him almost nailing his arms but she didn’t care as she listened to her cousin’s final words. She kept crying, sobbing alongside of her heart breaking into thousand pieces. “I love you. Scott. Scott McCall.”

“Don’t, please, don’t” Scott cried, a tear slipped down on his face to his chin. He begged her, he begged God, he begged everyone around him. Anyone who could hear his silent tears… “Allison, don’t, please.”

“Tell Stella that I love her” Allison murmured as she kept looking at Scott. She tried to take a breath in but it barely went through the right way to her lungs who were almost given up. “That I… That I love her so much. No matter what. I love her. Tell her that. Make sure she never forgets that. Please.”

“Allison, don’t” Scott said, his voice breaking. He tried to catch a breath but couldn’t. “You can tell her that yourself. Please, don’t. You’ll be okay. We’ll be okay. Please, don’t-”

“You have to tell my dad” Allison said in hurry, all of a sudden, interrupting him. It was almost like she knew her time was running out and she had to tell them. She had to tell them that she figured out. “You have to tell my dad. Tell him. Tell him…” After few short breathes, Stella saw her hand falling to the ground. She saw her red nails on the ground, not moving. She wasn’t moving. She wasn’t breathing.

And Stella knew, everything was over then.

“No” she murmured, stuttering. She sobbed, turned to Isaac between his arms. “No. She’s gone.” She tried to gulp the lump away. “No, no, no, no… This… This can’t be happening, no.” Isaac was looking at her, broken. Tears were falling down on Stella’s face; her eyes were red. She kept shaking her head to both sides heatedly. “No, Isaac, she can’t be… She can’t…” She loudly cried, sobbed. She shook her head, not wanting to accept what just happened; Isaac pulled her into a tight hug. Stella sobbed loudly, heartbreakingly into his chest, her tears dropping on his jacket.

Scott was still on the ground, sitting there with Allison’s lifeless body between his arms, crying over her and it was in that moment when Chris caught up with them. He made his way to the fences of the Oak Creek but when he saw her daughter, not moving, not breathing… He felt like someone just ripped his heart out and he felt the need to stop. His eyes opened widely, trying to take it all in. He saw Scott hugging his daughter’s body, loudly crying with the grief. He saw his niece, Stella, between Isaac’s arms. Isaac was looking at Allison with his chin on the top of Stella’s hair, hugging her tightly in pain, sobbing their hearts out.

Then what happened sank in and the reality hit him. And then he felt the grief of losing his daughter and he felt like he lost his balance, he couldn’t move, he couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t think about anything, holding onto the the bar tightly. It was the only thing that supported him standing up on his feet. He felt his whole body too heavy to carry as Stella’s loud, heart crushing sobbing echoed through the Oak Creek after losing her cousin, her sister, feeling her pain.

Chris kept holding onto the bars there, in front of the gates of Oak Creek where he just lost his daughter, trying to breathe through the pain. 


	24. THE DEVINE MOVE

Stella felt the numbness and the panic inside her heart, unable to breath. Her heart was working but she felt like it wasn’t. It was pumping and it was pumping fast, that was for sure but was that enough for her to feel that she was alive? Because she felt like she was dying. That moment, her last moments was replaying through her mind over and over again as she was trying to remember the story that they… her uncle came up with to tell the cops who didn’t know about the supernatural world.

It was a movie night so Isaac, Lydia, Scott, Stella and Allison… they were all there. There were also two other guys. One of them, probably, had a knife that killed Allison. They called Chris first. That was their story. And as Stella was sitting on the couch, at the precinct with Scott, Lydia, and Isaac, just as numb as her, she looked for Allison. She needed Allison to be there to give her strength that she lost just couple hours ago. She needed her more than ever.

But Allison was gone. She was dead, and all Stella wanted to do was scream, cry, and tear the place down instead of just sitting here under the sad eyes who was feeling sorry for her. She was the focus, everyone felt bad for her among the four since she was the one who lost a family and she was the one who had to sit in Sheriff’s office, answering questions.

And sitting here, telling their made-up story to the cops, telling them that Allison died because of nothing was not helping her. Because in the story, she was the victim. She was the victim who got stabbed in the stomach for nothing. She wasn’t the hero. And Allison was a hero. Only few of them got to know the real story and not being able to tell the story, not being able to shout out what actually happened, that she was a freaking hero was not helping her.

So, she shook her head in disbelief and wiped away her tear using the back of her hand with a sharp motion. She quickly got up, not being able to sit still for any longer. She ignored their confused, wondering, worried, sad gazes and headed for the door. She heard Parrish sigh and then his voice followed. “Where are you going?” he emphatically questioned, feeling sorry for her.

Stella’s hand stopped on the door handle, looking down. She didn’t move her fingers away, but she hung onto it. She used it as a support to stand up since she felt exhausted. She felt like she lost her support in life. The pain, the wound, the grief was just too fresh. “I can’t… I can’t stay here any longer” she answered, turning her body to look at Parrish. The tears started to fill in her eyes, causing her to grimace as she felt the walls were coming onto her, suffocating her and she felt like if she didn’t go out now, she was going to have a panic attack for the first time in a very long time. She sighed, swallowed hard. “Look, it all happened too fast, okay? One minute, we were laughing near the car and the next thing I know those two… douchebags… They…” She couldn’t finish her sentence, telling them the fake story once again. She tried to take a deep breath. “I don’t remember anything else. Please. I’m begging you. Please… Let me go.” Parrish looked at her, not knowing what to say as he felt bad about her once again. He nodded, giving her permission. Stella’s gaze moved to her friends who were just sitting there, feeling the emptiness inside them. “I… I can’t do this.” She shook her head, silently crying. “I can’t… I’m sorry.”

And then she quickly opened the door, wiping her tears away without anyone seeing but she wasn’t that lucky. “Stella?” she heard the Sheriff saying, catching her right when she closed the door behind her. Stella looked up to him with her blood red eyes. Sheriff gulped down, seeing all kinds of emotions there. “Hey, come here. Sta-”

“I’m fine” Stella managed to say, forcing herself. Her voice cracked, she stuttered. She didn’t even believe it herself, but she had to say it. She had to be the strong one. “I’m fine.” She breathed in, hiding her sobbing. “I, uh, I have to go. I have to go. I have to find… yeah.” She shook her head heatedly, broken, not even following, or knowing what she was doing. “I have to go.”

She didn’t finish her sentence and under Sheriff’s worried glances, she left the station.

“Should be fine in a couple of hours” Derek announced as he turned off the fire on the lighter. He had to burn the wound on twin’s backs so the wolfsbane wouldn’t spread and kill them. He was done with Aiden a while ago and now Ethan was good to go as well while Aiden was looking outside the window, thinking the text message that Derek got from Stiles about Allison. He tried calling Stella, sending her messages but… She didn’t turn back to any of them which was understandable but he had to talk to her. “Unless whoever shot you manages to find you again.”

“Stella’s with Scott” Aiden said, as he felt like he couldn’t stay in the loft any longer. He had to find Stella and with that thought, he turned around and headed for the door. Judging by the tone of his voice and the way he was moving, he seemed to be in a hurry. He could only imagine the situation Stella was in because he knew how much Allison meant to her. He had to see her, make sure that she was… breathing. “We need to go.”

“Are you gonna try to convince her to go with you?” Derek sarcastically questioned as Ethan put his shirt back on and pushed himself off the table, looking at Derek and his brother. Meanwhile Derek kept his gaze on Aiden and continued. “And maybe Lydia too?”

“I’m gonna try and convince them to run and hide” Aiden corrected him, turning around again to look at him. He was almost yelling as if it was an argument because in his mind, it felt like it was. “Like any sane person would do.”

Derek raised his brows, turned to Ethan. “And Danny?” he guessed.

“Allison’s dead” Ethan started his explanation, like it was so obvious what they were gonna do. His eyes were locked on Derek just like Aiden’s were. “Stiles is dying. What do you think?”

“I think Danny won’t believe you” Derek stated his thoughts, mocking his plan since he knew it was not going to work at all. He turned to look at Aiden, continued. “And Stella and Lydia? They would never run and hide.”

“Because of Stiles?” Aiden frustratedly questioned, almost shouting with the worry rising inside him for Stella.

“Because of Scott _and_ Allison” Derek answered strictly, harshly. “You’ve been trying to find a way into his pack. Trying to earn his trust, trying to fight for him. You’ve had it wrong the whole time. Stella’s been telling everyone that she’s not part of the pack but still, she’s doing a better job than you two could ever do.” His eyes were moving on the twins, paying attention to both of them, knowing they were listening. “You don’t fight for a leader. You fight for a leader’s cause.”

“What cause?” Aiden asked, dropping his shoulders.

“Scott’s always been about one thing” Derek explained, responding him. “Saving his friends. He will do anything and everything to save the people he cares about. When all hope is lost, he finds another way. And when he’s beaten down, he stands up again.” Derek paused to catch a breath and then continued his speech. “You want to earn a place in his pack? You want redemption? Find another way to stand up and fight.”

It was almost like Derek had other things to say but he couldn’t find a chance to when the door to the loft slid open, Stella appearing behind it. Three werewolves looked at the young girl who looked exhausted as hell, like she’s been awake and not sleeping for a long time. He had bags underneath her eyes. Her eyes were blood shot. They could see the marks of the tears left from her eyes to her chins on her face. 

But after pushing her grief away for the moment to let herself feel it later, there was only anger left. Enough anger to track down the Nogitsune and kill him and every last oni that there was left for taking the person she loved the most away from her, for leaving her alone in a world without Allison in it.

Aiden took a one step towards her as he saw the tracks that tears left on her beautiful face. He sensed her chemo signals, feeling the anger and the grief and just the emptiness… He sighed. Stella was worse than he thought, and he hated seeing her like that.

“He’s right” Stella stated with a straight face that she could hold as much as possible, her voice was firm as much as possible. She was trying to hide her emotions as much as she could even though she knew she was failing. “I would _never_ run and hide. Not after what he did… That’s why I’m here right now.” Stella looked away from Aiden, looked at Derek. “Kira and Stiles told me that whatever held the Nogitsune before was made from Nemeton and I know you have a box just for this occasion. Lydia says we need it. I told them we’re gonna meet up at the school.”

Derek nodded; Stella took a deep breath as she was feeling exhausted already. And then she stumbled, losing her balance and the first one to run to her was Aiden who saw her almost falling down. “Hey, hey, hey…” He grabbed her by the arm, helping her to stand still. “What’s wrong? You okay?” he asked, worried about her. Derek and Ethan walked towards her. They were also worried and curious about what was going on.

Stella nodded. “I’m fine…” It was almost like she had to say it when someone asked her how she was doing even when she wasn’t doing fine. “I’m just… Something’s happening” she murmured, looking at Ethan, Derek, and Aiden as she was still holding onto Aiden’s arms. “I had this sudden rushing feeling, like we’re running out of time.”

All other could do was exchange a worried look as they all knew what was next.

And the night came. The sky was dark, full of clouds as Stella was standing in front of the big windows in the loft, watching the skyline. She was thinking, something that she shouldn’t have been doing but, thankfully, she heard Derek. “Hey, you coming?” he asked with a voice that was full of worry.

Stella looked at Derek over her shoulder, also looking at the twins as well. “Yeah, uh, I’ll be right there” she answered, feeling like she needed that one minute right now. Ever since she died, she was just running around, trying to push the thoughts away. And now, she just needed to be alone for a second.

But Aiden noticed the way her voice cracked. He looked at his brother and Derek, shaking his head. “You go” he whispered to them softly. “We’ll be right behind you.” Derek sighed and nodded. With Ethan behind him, they went out of the room to his car, leaving Aiden and Stella alone. Aiden sighed and when it was just the two of them, he walked up to Stella who knew know was on the edge. “Hey,” he softly called out. “You okay?”

And he hated the question the minute it left his lips. It was a ridiculous question and when Stella didn’t answer, he didn’t say anything. He couldn’t blame her.

But then he heard her cracked voice. She was still looking out from the window and Aiden could see her reflection. He didn’t like what he saw. “She’s gone” Stella whispered. Stella felt like it was just hitting her. The fact that Allison was no longer around to help her, to lift her up... She turned around, looked at the young man behind her and then Aiden’s heart broke as he saw how red her eyes were. She was crying silently, not sobbing. Just crying… Just tears streaming down on her face. It broke him, seeing her like that. But he was glad that she wasn’t alone when she finally faced the realization… He was glad that he was here with her. “Allison’s gone.” She gulped, trying to get rid of the lump and shook her head slowly. “I don’t… I don’t know how to… I don’t know how to deal with that. I… I can’t. I’m not strong enough.”

“Come here” Aiden murmured, pulling her into a tight like he wanted to put every broken piece back inside her. It was a cliché, definitely something out of a romance book or movie and definitely something Aiden thought he would never do or even think of doing to anyone. Ever. But there he was… Holding that Argent girl so tight, thinking maybe, just maybe, he could put the pieces of her broken heart together.

They just stood there for a while. She rested her head on Aiden’s chest, silently sobbing but also doing some thinking about the last Argent Girls day, thinking about Allison and the things they were talking about, the things that she told her.

And then it hit her again, making her realize something else as she was just standing there with _him._ She couldn’t help the gasp that left her lips, the sharp breath that left her lungs. She thought about Allison’s last words to Scott and to her and, in that moment, she was sure of it.

But as she pulled herself back as much as Aiden’s arms let her and looked right in his brown eyes, she had no idea what to say. “Aiden, I…” She stopped herself. She couldn’t say what she had to say. There were lots of reasons to it. She thought about Allison, the emptiness she was feeling and right now… She had 5 onis to deal with and she just didn’t have the strength in her to say these things to him. So, she gulped the words down that brought a little color to her heart. At first, she didn’t want to say anything. She just wanted to tell him to let’s go and kill the sons of bitches but then she found herself wanting to say something. “I, uh… I don’t want you to leave me alone” she said softly, almost begging. “I can’t… I can’t do it.”

Aiden softly smiled, placed a kiss on the top of her head causing Stella to close her eyes for a split second as she took a deep breath into her lungs along with his smell. “I’m always going to be here” he assured her. He rested his chin on the top of Stella’s head, looking outside as he was thinking and watching the moon and the clouds. “I’m not leaving you, Stella.”

Stella looked at Aiden again. “Can you promise me that?” she asked, feeling so vulnerable. But right now, she needed him to say this. She needed him to promise her. “Please?”

Aiden smiled. “I promise” he said and then continued with a grin. “Besides, you still owe me a date, right?”

Stella looked at Derek who was walking in the front holding the box that they were planning to trap the fox into. She had her gun hanging on her belt, her sword she was holding between her fingers as she was moving on her feet between Aiden and Ethan. She knew the others were already at the school and they had to take the box to them as soon as possible so that they would win this.

Stella saw the Nogitsune who was sitting on the stairs ahead of them with two ninjas… onis behind him causing her anger to rise up but she tried to calm herself for the moment, tried to hide that anger to the actual battle. Just looking at their faces made Stella furious as hell which was something she could use during the fight.

“Did you bring us a present?” Nogitsune teasingly asked, grinning up to his ears. Derek leaned down, put the box on the ground. He was all wolfed out with glowing blue eyes, his claws and his fangs with hairs on his cheek.

“I brought three” Derek corrected him, looking at the Nogitsune. Aiden, Stella, and Ethan stood right next to Derek in the light. If it were for them, Stella would never be with them, fighting to stall them. She would be out there with Scott and the others. It felt more safer than fighting in the field but after what she’s been through, he knew she needed this. And she was stubborn as hell who wouldn’t take no for an answer when it came to that.

And Derek felt like she needed to get her revenge.

“I’ve heard of an Alpha pack, Derek, but not a pack of former Alphas” he commented. “It’s a little sad, isn’t it?” And then as he noticed Stella, he tilted his head to the side. “And you have an Argent by your side despite everything that happened the other day.” Stella felt the anger, held tighter to the sword. She was holding it so tight that her knuckles were white. The void Stiles pouted. “And if you ask me… That’s kind of a risky move. I mean… Three former alphas and an Argent who is grieving. Hmm. Who would bet on you on a fight?”

“I might not be an Alpha anymore” Derek reacted, taking few steps towards him. He wasn’t backing down. “But I can still fight like one.”

As the werewolves loudly roared, Stella pulled up her sword, get into her attack position and they all ran to the onis, attacking them first.

“I told you to stay behind” Aiden shouted as he kept fighting an oni. It’s been few minutes already and Stella saved their asses more than they could count but Aiden was still worried about her. He thought her grief could be a distraction but, apparently, he was the only one who thought that way.

Stella laughed annoyed, blocked an oni sword from slashing Aiden. “Yeah, you want me to cook dinner for you when you get home, too?” Stella shouted back. She hit the oni, throwing it away from them. As Derek and Ethan kept fighting three of them at the same time and Stella temporarily knocked out another, she looked at Aiden. She pointed the oni she threw away with a kick and parted her lips. “You’re welcome, by the way.”

Then she turned around like she felt the oni behind her, swinging her sword to stop it. Aiden was watching her in awe even in this situation. “I’m sorry” he apologized, making Stella crack a soft yet broken smile.

“Where the hell are they?” Aiden shouted after a long time of clawing, fighting, kicking, roaring and getting his ass saved by Stella. It’s been almost thirty minutes or something close to that, and even though he was a werewolf, fighting with entities that were hard to kill was a tiring thing to do and he had no idea how long they could hold them off. It was just three werewolves and one human against 4 ninjas who were hard to kill. They still had no idea how Allison did that, and they didn’t have time to figure it out.

“The jeep’s here” Ethan answered, shouting as well. “They have to be somewhere.” Stella grunted as she pushed the oni with her sword and caused it to fall to the ground. Its sword slid away from it.

“In the school!” Derek shouted, still fighting claw to sword. He looked at the twins and Stella for a second. “You have to get on the box! Someone, get on the box!” Stella’s eyes drifted to the box but then two onis appeared in front of her. She cursed, kicked the oni who attacked her first and ducked away from a swinging sword.

“I hate ninjas” Aiden murmured, looking at the way Stella was fighting with them. He glowed his blue eyes, roared and walked up to them. He pushed Stella out of the way, dodged a swinging sword above his head but wasn’t so lucky with the second attack. As a sword cut his back, Stella screamed his name. She stood up, ran to help him out.

She was not going to lose Aiden, too.

“We can’t do this!” Aiden screamed, threw the oni away from him. He looked around, seeing everyone fighting but he also knew they were all tired. “We can’t beat them!”

“Take the box!” Ethan shouted back, holding his arm that got wounded during the fight with an oni. He looked at Stella. She was the only human among them. “We’ll hold them off!” And then he saw an oni running to attack him but Derek grabbed him and threw him to the ground. But the oni got up, swung his sword. Derek roared at him but before he could do anything else, the oni exploded with a yellow grey smoke around it. They looked up, where the arrow came from with a frown and they saw Chris. Isaac flipped in the air, landed on the ground, and looked up at Stella. And that’s when she realized how to kill the onis. Allison’s silver arrowheads… “What was that?” Ethan shouted to be heard by Chris, looking at him curiously as he was still holding his arm.

“Silver” Chris replied. His voice came out angry and firm. He was angry at the onis who killed his daughter.

Stella stood up, trying to ignore her wound. She kept breathing heavily through the pain as she pulled up her sleeve, looking at the gun hanging on her belt. She knew what to do but then she remembered something. Her brown eyes found Isaac. “Isaac, the box!” she shouted all of a sudden. Her voice came out cracked due to her wound and how tired she was but still powerful enough for him to hear her. “Get the triskele box to Scott!”

Isaac quickly straightened up, grabbed the box, and ran his way to the school, leaving them in the battlefield once again.

After Isaac was gone; they kept fighting with the onis, but it looked like as Chris was killing them one by one while the others were just holding them off which they had no problem with. Argent was shooting them with silver arrows, Stella was swinging her sword, and the others were using their claws and supernatural strengths. Everything was going great, Stella felt like they were finally winning.

Until that last arrow…

As the arrow flew to the last oni standing, he broke it in half using his sword. The pieces fell to the ground in two pieces. Stella gasped, looking at the arrow. Her uncle said something, but she couldn’t hear as she was thinking something else. She knew it was the last arrow. She’s counted. So, she reached out for her gun thinking it was a waste of time and health if they tried to get the arrow.

Stella threw her sword away quickly and grabbed her gun.

Seeing that, Aiden ran to the last oni to give Stella time as she put the bullets in and turned the safety on and also to protect her. Stella’s hands were shaking for some reason, there was something… She could hear the voices from a distance, almost felt like in her mind. But she tried to ignore them. She aimed and shot. She watched the silver bullet fly through the air, to inside the oni. 

Stella smiled when the bullet hit the last oni and exploded him with yellow dust and a black smoke. But then something happened that froze that smile, got her heart to beat faster. Stella’s eyes moved to Aiden, thinking that they won. Thinking that they killed all the onis and the others were doing fine with the Void Stiles.

But then she saw it. She saw the sword hanging inside Aiden’s stomach. The voices started echoing again, the world stopped moving. Her gun fell down from her hands onto the ground and thankfully it didn’t fire but right now, it was least of her worries. “No, no… AIDEN!!” She screamed and knowing that it was her this time, unlike the other day in the Oak Creek. The werewolf pulled the sword out, it hit the ground. The sound echoed through Stella’s brain and in ears and then Aiden fell down. “No, no, no, no” she started to murmur as she ran to him.

Ethan was already there, holding his brother, tears streaming down on his face. He held Aiden by the back of his neck as Stella kneeled right next to Ethan, looking at Aiden. His chin was covered with blood, coming out from his mouth and as Stella kept looking at him, her eyes flickering with tears, there was nothing she could do but hold his hand tight.

She couldn’t believe what was happening. She never thought coming to Beacon Hills would change her life this much. She didn’t see it coming. First, she made friends that she could die for. Friends that she could call them her family. And then her grades fell to C from A. And as she gained people, she lost people. She lost the most important person in her life and now…

Yes, she was losing the first man she’s ever loved. 

Derek’s broken gaze were moving between Aiden and Stella while Chris was walking towards them slowly. One tear left Stella’s eyes, rolled down to her chin and onto the ground. Aiden was grimacing, holding his breath with the pain that he was in and Stella felt like she couldn’t breathe. She felt like the time where she first met the onis. She felt like someone was dragging her breath, her voice, her everything away from her body. It was like they were taking all of her strength away, leaving her alone and powerless and numb. Cold and shaking…

“Does it… Does it hurt you as much as it hurts me?” Aiden managed to ask to his brother, his voice shaking. Stella’s been looking at Aiden, locked on him, only thinking about one thing. Her mind was repeating, not being able to follow what was happening once again. No, no, no, no... It couldn’t happen again. Not after her… She couldn’t lose Aiden after Allison. She couldn’t take it. She wasn’t strong enough to take it.

Ethan nodded slowly, crying. “Yeah” he sobbed, whimpering. Even though the pain of losing his brother was covering the physical pain, he still felt it. He felt everything that Aiden felt. He felt what Stella felt when she lost Allison the other day.

Meanwhile for Stella… Watching them, watching their bond, remembering Allison, remembering everything… It hit her again. Her eyes moved from their locked-up hands to Aiden’s face as she remembered a conversation they had before, just few nights ago. And then… she just found herself shouting. “I love you” she said, not wanting to hold it back anymore. She had to say these words before it was too late. And It was already too late. Stella sobbed, tears falling down. She held his hand tighter. She tried to breathe, but it felt like she couldn’t. Like she needed it more than anything but there was something pushing her down underwater. “I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you. I love you so much.” She paused, sobbing. She shook her head feverishly to both sides. She didn’t care about the fact that everyone was watching them. She just didn’t care. “Aiden, please… please” she cried, begged. She just couldn’t hold back anymore. The tears, the feelings… None of it. She needed this to be a sick joke. She needed this to be another nightmare. It felt like a nightmare but… She just couldn’t wake up. “You told me… You told me I owe you a date, right? You said…” Her lips were shaking, she couldn’t finish the sentence, looking at Aiden who was looking at her back with tears in his eyes, watching her in pain. “Aiden, please. You promised me… You promised me that you weren’t going to leave me alone.” Her voice got lower and lower by the second. Chris tilted his head down, feeling like he wasn’t supposed to be here. Because he knew his niece. He knew she never told anyone that she loved them. Especially with this meaning… Stella pressed her lips softly on Aiden’s, locking them, not caring about the blood on his chin. She felt his tired and soft lips moving back on hers, kissing her back while Derek was watching them, thinking. His eyes were on Stella. Ethan was crying. Everyone was crying when Stella finally pulled back. “Aiden, I love you” she sobbed. “I know it’s too late to say it but… I love you. Please don’t leave me. I love you. I can’t… Please, don’t leave me.”

Aiden held Stella’s hand tighter and even though he was dying, he felt the happiness. He felt happy, hearing those words from Stella after everything they’ve been through. He felt like he didn’t deserve it. He felt like she was too good for him. He felt like she could do so much better. And he felt happier even on his last breath. The true happiness in his heart… “I…” he had to stop, coughed. “I love you, Stella.” Stella sobbed again, watching Aiden, listening him. “I love you. It’s okay.” She held tight to her hand, feeling some sort of peace in his mind. He finally heard the things he wanted to hear but then something crawled back to his mind. Aiden knew Stella trusted him now and he couldn’t be happier but as he thought someone else who was there for him during the ‘being good’ process, someone who couldn’t trust him… Remembering her… Remembering that girl with green eyes and strawberry blonde hair… It hurt Aiden. He coughed, tried to speak. “I wish… I wish Lydia could believe I was one of the good guys, too…”

“She’ll believe me” Derek said as a soft whisper.

Aiden hardly smiled, nodded and then his brown eyes found Stella for the one last time. His hand was still holding Stella’s, their fingers were between each other. He tried to smile. “I love you. It’s okay. I’m okay. You’re okay.” As Stella sobbed, she closed her eyes. Tears running down on her face. Aiden coughed, feeling the life force inside him was leaving with the pain that caused by the oni sword. He leaned back, losing the control of his body as he breathed in for one last time. A breath that he couldn’t give it back as his heart stopped beating. His hand loosened up on hers and Stella knew it was too late now. Too late for anything.

He was gone.

“No…” she sobbed, her voice cracking. “No, plea… Please. No.” She cried. Tears falling down on her face like there wasn’t an ending for them. Because Stella felt like there wasn’t. She leaned on, rested her head against Aiden’s lifeless body, her ear on his chest but she couldn’t hear any heartbeat. She kept sobbing, crying. “You promised… Aiden, no… You promised! You promised…”

Ethan was crying, listening to her sobbing, holding his twin’s hand still. He didn’t want to believe what was happening. He didn’t want to believe anything. He didn’t want to believe he was alone now, that he lost the one person who’s always been there for him since the day they were born.

And Stella cursed to herself. She was too late to tell how she felt for Aiden. She was too stubborn and too blind to do it and she lost their only chance. She was the reason why they wasted their time and now it was gone.

And then the school’s door opened widely, Lydia ran outside to the end of the stairs. She felt it. She heard Stella and she felt Aiden’s death. And as they defeated the Nogitsune, saving Stiles, she felt happy and then the feelings, the screaming, the voices came. She stood up, walked outside with Stiles behind her and then she saw him.

She saw Ethan and Stella sitting on the ground in the middle of the yard right next to Aiden’s lifeless body. Both of them were crying. Chris’ hand was on Ethan’s shoulder, giving him support as Derek’s hand was moving up and down on Stella’s shaking body, trying to comfort her even though he knew he wasn’t going to be able to.

Lydia turned around, ran to Stiles to hug him as the grief and the pain inside her caused the pain of losing one of her friends after losing her best friend. Young man gasped, seeing what Lydia saw. His hands grabbed her tight, moving on her body, trying to calm her down as her body started shaking with tears. And in that moment all Lydia was able to think was how she lost two of her best friends in two days.

But Stella was the only thing Stiles could think of in that moment as his eyes were on her from a distance. He realized she loved Aiden way before she admitted to herself. Nogitsune knew that and when Stella refused him, he went after the people she loved. Allison and Aiden… And, however, the Nogitsune was gone, he got his revenge like he promised to Stella. She lost her cousin and the man she loved in two days and Stiles wasn’t sure if she was going to pull it together after that even though he knew how strong she was.

As Stiles kept hugging Lydia, he promised himself to look after them. He was going to look after Stella and Lydia, protect them.

**_…A week later…_ **

“You don’t have to keep following me around, you know that, right?” Stella asked but there was something in her voice that bothered the hell out of Stiles. She was numb. Empty... She was acting like she had no emotions, but Stiles knew she had as he stopped hiding behind the tree and quietly walked up to her.

It’s been almost over a week since the incident at the school and everyone’s been worried about her ever since, acting like she was a time bomb. Because aside from the fact that she wept on their bodies, Allison’s, and Aiden’s back to back in two days… she didn’t show any emotions whatsoever. She didn’t cry at Allison’s funeral. She didn’t cry as Ethan and she buried Aiden, not telling anyone but they came to support them anyway. But this was the problem because as Stella buried Aiden, she buried everything inside, she tried to act like everything was doing okay.

And Stiles was worried.

As they kept walking in the woods silently, not saying anything, Stella kept her mouth shut. But then the pain was too much, and she found herself screaming like a normal person who was grieving. Stiles startled but he let her have this moment since he knew she needed it. He watched her scream, hit a rock and ended up hurting her feet. “Damn it!” She shouted, her voice echoed in the woods, causing birds to fly away. “Damn it! It had to be those two, right? It had to be! It had to be Allison and Aiden, right?!” Stella screamed, hit a random tree. She could feel the anger, the grieve, the anxiety… Everything climbing out of the surface and she hated it. She hated everything. And as she felt the physical pain on her knuckles due to hitting the tree, she shook her head. “I…” Stiles looked at her. He wasn’t talking, he was just standing there. “I don’t know… I don’t know what I’m gonna do. They’re gone now and I…” And then Stiles quickly pulled her into a hug as she cried. She was breathing heavily, shallowly but it felt more like she was trying to breath. She tried to control her anger and sadness. She failed. She cried more.

After a while, Stiles pulled her away to see if she was okay. She held her one arm away but startled and gasped with the thing he saw. “Stella” he managed to whisper. His hands started to shake with shock as he tried to grab his phone. He had to call Scott. He had to call Scott or Derek right now. “Stella, your eyes…”

Stella’s heart started pounding as she knew what was happening. She freed herself from Stiles’ touch, shook her head and stepped back. “I have to go” she murmured. “Please. Don’t follow me.”

And without saying anything else, she started walking backwards till she turned around and ran away from him. “Hey, Stella, wait!” He shouted but Stella ignored him and all of a sudden, she turned into an actual wolf. Stiles jumped back with more shock and with shaky fingers, under the moonlight, she found Scott’s name on his contact list.

“Wait, she’s a what?” Scott asked, shocked as he was. He rose up on his elbows in his bed as he was trying to understand what Stiles has been saying. He was very confused and for the last few days, very numb like the rest of them. He couldn’t stop playing Allison’s death in his mind over and over again. He just couldn’t forget about it. Holding her hand, hearing her last words… It was too much for him.

“A wolf, Scott!” Stiles shouted over the phone as he was walking back to his jeep with fast and somehow very worried steps. He was extremely worried and scared and didn’t know what to think or do. He didn’t know what was happening because he was absolutely sure that Stella wasn’t bitten, and he was also sure that she wasn’t supposed to be a werewolf or an actual wolf for that matter. “An actual wolf!”

“But she’s not bitten” Scott said but it came out like a question. He quickly got out of his bed, tried to find his pants to get dressed and meet with Stiles to help Stella out. “How could that happen?”

“Hell, if I know” Stiles murmured, opening the door to the Jeep. He grabbed the flashlight, closed the door back and made his way back to the woods. “I’m going after her right now, but I need your help Scott.” He sighed. “Come here as soon as possible, okay? We have to find her.”

They found Stella near the burned down Hale house, inside the woods. Scott looked at Stiles as they were calmly approaching her. The wolf she turned to had dark brown fur and when the boys realized this wolf looked like the wolf she was seeing in her hallucinations… They still had no idea what’s been happening.

Stiles stayed behind as Scott slowly made his way to Stella. He raised his eyebrows, feeling calm so that she wouldn’t freak out and run away. “Stella?” he said. The wolf looked at him with glowing eyes, feeling skittish. Scott sensed that she was terrified, so he glowed his eyes red and roared like he did to Malia before.

Few seconds later, Stella was laying on the leaves naked. Stiles quickly walked up to them with a jacket and put it on the young girl as he helped her get up. She was shaking, her heart was pounding. Stella gulped down, looked at Scott. “What… Wha-?” She had nothing to say but she had one question in her mind. “What were the color of my eyes?” she asked. Scott and Stiles was surprised to see this was the only question but as they saw her eyes, they looked at each other debating whether they should tell her or not.

But then Stiles looked at her, nervous as he was playing with his fingers. He was still holding her, trying to warm her up with the only piece of clothing she had on. “Blue” he responded as he remembered one more time how her brown eyes suddenly glowed bright blue. Knowing the meaning, Stella gasped. “They were glowing blue, Stella.”

She looked at Scott as they were all thinking about it. Blue eyes meant she killed an innocent soul. Stella immediately thought about the bomb she sent to the sheriff station and the trap she built in the woods, but she knew it wasn’t working like that. It wasn’t her who did those things. It was the Nogitsune who was using her face. It wasn’t entirely her. She gulped down. Blue eyes meant she killed someone directly, not through a part of the soul. In order to get blue eyes, it had to be done by the person. But it was bringing out another problem to her head. 

Stella didn’t know who she killed, who was the reason that her eyes were glowing bright blue.

By the end of this week Ethan, Isaac and Chris were already out of Beacon Hills. She knew Chris and Isaac were headed to France. She had no idea where Ethan was supposed to be going but she understood him and that was actually what Stella had in mind. She just needed a place to go which was taken care of by Deaton.

As she remembered the little conversation they had, stopped the engine of her car, took a deep breath.

_**** Stella took another deep breath as she tried to touch the mountain ash one more time but as a purple invisible force pushed her hand away, Deaton walked in. She still couldn’t believe she was a freaking werewolf with glowing blue eyes. She was a hunter, she’s been touching wolfsbane, mountain ash and all the things supernatural creatures weren’t able to touch and now all of a sudden, her life was more upside down than ever and as her first full moon was coming up, she was just trying to fix what was left in her life._

_Which was closer to nothing_

_“It feels strange, doesn’t it?” Deaton questioned curiously, looking at her as he walked in and stood across from her. He had a soft, comforting smile on his face that normally would warm Stella up but now? She actually felt empty._

_Stella nodded, crossed her arms in front of her chest and looked at Deaton. “You said you found something about me being a werewolf and a banshee at the same time” Stella quickly said, getting right to it._

_Deaton nodded yes, understanding her. “First of all, I know why you and Lydia have different powers. I’ve talked to an emissary in London” he explained, crossing his arms in front of his chest. Stella raised her eyebrows, gesturing him to continue. “I’ve actually thought about it but didn’t believe that until I saw your eyes. The blue in your eyes explains a lot Stella.” Young girl sighed; Deaton continued. “The place you are going during your hallucinations is Bardo. You are coming and going between life and death because banshees predict death, they don’t cause it.”_

_“Awesome.” Stella licked her lips nervously, nodding him to show she understood. “What about me being a werewolf?” she asked. “I still have troubles controlling it and I don’t want to cause another death.”_

_“Yeah, about that…” Deaton placed his hands on the table, looked at Stella. “I still don’t know how or why you are two creatures at the same time, but I do know someone in London. He is an alpha werewolf. He is just like you; he can turn into an actual wolf. As a matter of fact, he can turn into both right now. I called him up. He said he could teach you.” Deaton took a breath in before he continued. “His name is Max and he has a pack in London with his sister Dani. He said you’re welcome there anytime you want.”_

_Stella breathed out, nodded as she agreed with him. “I was planning on going anyway” she murmured before she made her way to the door to get out. “And London doesn’t seem so bad. In fact, it sounds very far away which is amazing.” ****_

Stella stopped thinking about that and walked slowly to Stiles’ room where he was taking things out of his board. There were papers, articles, and red strings on the ground. Everything he was using to solve a case. “Hey” she said, trying to get Stiles’ attention on her. When Stiles heard her voice, he quickly turned around, looked at the young Argent. He stopped whatever he was doing as she kept talking, asking. “What are you doing?”

“Clearing my head” Stiles answered, nervously pulling his green shirt down. Stella moved her tongue on her lower lip, nodded. And then Stiles parted his lips. “What are you doing?”

“I thought… I thought I could say goodbye to at least one of you before… Before I leave the town, Beacon Hills” Stella murmured, taking a step inside the room looking around with nostalgia. She shrugged, gulped down. She’s been feeling tired for the last week and thinking about a 12-hour long flight wasn’t helping. “Isaac and Chris are already in France. Good for them. They asked me to come but France…” She pressed her lips together and with a deep breath she continued. “Ethan is… God knows where.” She put her hands inside her pocket and looked at Stiles. “Deaton found me a place that I could go. Apparently, there is an alpha in London who can help me with my shifting. The same dude is happened to be Jackson’s alpha as well.” Stiles frowned as he thought about Jackson’s _‘I do not need an alpha’_ speech. Stella noticed that, softly scoffed. “Yeah, I was surprised, too. But honestly… I don’t even care at this point. So, I texted him. He’s going to pick me up, and I’m going to the airport after here. I guess I’ll… I’ll stay with him for a while.”

Stiles looked at Stella as he tried to process everything she’s said. He couldn’t say anything about her leaving since he could understand why. After everything that’s been happened, he didn’t really expect her to stay in Beacon Hills. “We’re gonna miss you, you know” he softly murmured, slightly pointed her and then crossed his fingers in front of him nervously. He was blaming himself. He was blaming himself for everything that happened. Allison’s death, Aiden’s death, their misery, her misery… Everything…

Stella smiled softly. “You can always call me when something is wrong” she reminded. “And definitely call me when something is not wrong. I prefer that conversation.” Stiles smiled as Stella continued. “But… I can’t stay here. I can’t stay in Beacon Hills. Everything is…” She pulled a broken, cracked breath in and couldn’t finish her sentences.

“What about school?” Stiles asked curiously, not even caring about it but felt like he had to ask to talk to her more. He hated goodbyes. “Are you gonna continue in London?”

Stella shook her head. “Chris talked to the principal” she said, explaining. “He still remembers my grandfather and my family and…”

Stiles smiled softly. “He was totally terrified, wasn’t he?”

“Definitely” Stella answered, chuckled. “He managed to get me 2 months off, considering my grades and credits and everything that’s happened. I don’t know what’s going to happen after. I really don’t. I can still pass this term and be a senior. Hell, I can even graduate but…” Stiles nodded but then Stella pulled him into an unexpected hug. She sighed, tucking her nose into his shoulder. “Thank you” she whispered and then she quickly pulled away. She smiled. “Goodbye Stilinski.”

And without anything else, she made her way back downstairs and to her car.

She sat on the driver’s seat, looked at the Stilinski’s house. She gulped down. Even after everything, leaving was still the hardest part of the process. And leaving without saying goodbye to Scott, Lydia… Her brown eyes found the rearview, saw her reflection. “An end of another era, ha?” she murmured, looked at the necklace hanging. She smiled. It was Allison’s half of the necklace that they purchased together. It was a reminder of her.

She sighed again, started the engine, and drove to the airport leaving Beacon Hills behind.


	25. THE FAMOUS FINAL SCENE

****

_“You’re coming straight home.” As she heard Chris’ reminder, she tried so hard no to roll her eyes and say anything since her punishment was pretty expected after getting caught helping out Scott to catch Boyd and Cora even though she promised not to be involved in any kind of supernatural. She just had it coming. She knew it as she turned around, throwing her head back causing Allison to giggle secretly so that Chris wouldn’t see her. “Straight home, remember?”_

_“Yes” Stella said, feeling frustrated. “I got the first time you said it. I got the second time you said it.” She faked a smile. “And I definitely got third time when you said it. Loud and clear. As in shining crystal that lights up the whole world crystal clear. I go to school, come straight home. And Allison is not leaving my side for even a second except for classes.” She made a gun with her fingers and pointed her uncle with her index. “Got it. I remember.” She stopped smiling and turned to Allison, walking before her. “Let’s go.”_

_Allison chuckled, looked at her father. “Don’t worry about her” she said softly as she grabbed her bag from the counter. Laughed again. “She’s just-”_

_“I can hear you!” Stella shouted behind the door where she was waiting for Allison. Young girl laughed, hugged her father goodbye, and made her way outside the apartment, walking towards her cousin. Two girls walked the elevator, got in. As the doors closed, Stella looked at Allison. She frustratedly shouted. “You so owe me Argent; you don’t even know!”_

_Allison smiled; her brown eyes moved from the numbers on the screen to Stella. “I know and you are the best” she gratefully said, and she meant it. Because she knew she owed her. Stella covered up for her and now she was the one who was grounded for three days. Today was day one. “Let me make it up to you by buying you a coffee” she suggested._

_Stella was definitely waiting for this one. “I actually have something else in mind.” Allison frowned; Stella continued with a grin. “How about you cover for me for a change?” she suggested back and then smirked as she saw the way Allison was confused. The elevator stopped and as they got out and walked to Allison’s car since her car was temporarily confiscated by her uncle. “Aiden is sneaking in tonight and I really need that. And you owe me, so…” She opened her door and smiled at Allison. “Make it up to me by covering for me.”_

_And as she got inside, she ignored the horrified face of Allison._

_Since their first class was different, Allison and Stella had to go their separate ways. But first they stopped by their locker that were next to one and another. Both of them opened their lockers at the same time, putting their extra books and stuff in it and only grabbing the essentials when Stella heard that familiar voice arguing with a friend. “You’re unbelievable!” A girl was screaming at Stiles, definitely annoyed and frustrated by his attitude. She had light hair, amazing eyes. She was wearing a hoodie and jeans. Her locker was right across from Stella, so she stopped in front of it, causing Stiles to stop right next to her._

_“You-Oh, my God!” Stiles shouted back, annoyed as well. His hands were on his waist, tapping his foot down rhythmically on the ground. “You’re the one who’s telling me that? Seriously?”_

_“Yes, I’m telling you that dumbass” the girl argued back, turning around and opening her locker causing Stiles to roll his eyes._

_Stella chuckled, closing down her locker. She laid back and started watching them but then she softly waved her head to get Allison’s attention. “Hey, who is that girl Stilinski’s been arguing with?” she questioned. She was still new to the school. She saw her before, they had History together, but she never talked to her because she never got a chance to._

_Allison looked over her shoulder to see who she was talking about and saw the two people arguing about God knows what and turned back to her locker with a smile. “That is Aryanna” she answered Stella’s question. She still had few minutes before her first class, so she was kind of stalling to see Stella since she knew most of their classes were different today in a way that Chris didn’t like. “Everyone calls her Ary though, and she is childhood friends with Stiles.” She closed her locker and rested her back against the locker like Stella did. “I’ve met her few times. She’s really sweet.”_

_Stella smiled. “Yeah, I can tell” she said sincerely and then stopped watching them who were still arguing, and Stella was dying to know what they were arguing about. She looked at Allison, frowned. “Don’t you have class? Right about now?”_

_“Yeah, I’m gone!” she said as she started running to her class which Stella knew it was a bit far away from their current location. Stella laughed and then she heard Allison again. “See you in lunch! And if my dad calls, you’re in the toilet!”_

_“Okay! Thank you!” Stella shouted back and right she was about to walk to her class as well, she saw Stiles walking towards her frustrated. She stepped back as she was confused. First of all, their first classes were apart from each other. They had to meet for the second period. And second, she was really curious about the topic he was arguing over with Ary._

_And she was about to find out._

_“Why are you in the toilet?” Stiles questioned but then, without giving her a time to answer with her lips parted apart interrupted by Stiles, he continued. “Do I wear only one kind of clothing?” This was a sudden and a definitely a random question that left Stella speechless. Her eyes opened widely. She had no idea what this was all about, and she was definitely more confused than before. “I mean what do you think about my variety in wardrobe?”_

_“Stilinski, I’m not following” Stella reacted, feeling completely lost. And then waved her head towards the hall, gesturing him to walk with her. “But how about you follow me and enlighten me because I feel lost.” Stiles nodded and they started walking to Stella’s first class. “Now tell me, what happened?”_

_“My friend, Ary…” He stopped, walking alongside of Stella. “Childhood best friend, actually” he corrected himself and then continued. “She thinks… She jokes a lot about my lack of variety in wardrobe. That I only wear hoodies and flannels and stuff.”_

_Stella sucked a sharp breath in between her teeth loudly and looked at Stiles from the corner of her eyes. “Well, she does have a point” she said, causing Stiles to look at her with wide open eyes. Stella laughed, pulling her arms to sides in disbelief. “What?” she shouted. “Besides, flannels aren’t that bad. Be proud of the lack of variety in your wardrobe. Own it.”_

_As she kept joking and teasing with him, Stiles rolled his eyes and they kept walking down the hall._

_“Hey, you’re late” Scott said, pulling his bag to himself as he emptied the seat he saved for the young Argent. He watched Stella walk up to him and sat on the seat which was located near his. It was the Math class and it was the only class Stella and Scott had, just for the two of them._

_At least for this semester._

_“Yeah, well, I’m here now and the teacher is not so…” She sighed and put her books on the table. Meanwhile, Scott was just looking at her and feeling completely guilty about last night that she got her in trouble._

_“So, are you gonna tell me what happened?” he asked curiously. “Or you are just too angry with me that I got you busted?”_

_Stella smiled looking at Scott. “I’m not angry with you, Wolfy” she said, ensuring him. “But I got grounded for three days so don’t you think I won’t be milking that.”_

_“Yeah, sure, got it” Scott said, nodding. “Anything you want. Anything at all.” As Stella laughed, the teacher walked in. Scott and Stella smiled at each other and looked down at their books._

_After her math class with Scott and Physics class with Stiles, Stella had a free period. She was finally free from the books she was holding as they were back into her locker and, now, she was walking down the hall, headed for the ‘garden’ of the school as in Stella’s expression when someone grabbed her by the arm and pulled her inside the Janitors closet and closed the door behind them._

_Stella meant to scream as she startled but a large hand was covering her mouth and then she saw the responsible one. She saw those dark brown eyes, she saw the smirk and then found herself shaking her head in disbelief._

_Aiden pulled his hand away. “I got you, didn’t I?” he said, grinning._

_“You scared the crap out me, that’s what you did” she reacted but she was laughing. It’s been only few days since they started doing their little thing called ‘using sex for distraction’ but to be completely honest, Stella thought Aiden was just the best in that area. And for some reason, there was this chemistry between them. They didn’t know each other that well, they were definitely not dating but somehow, they were both feeling comfortable around each other. “I thought I’d see you tonight.”_

_“You talked to Allison?” he said, raising his eyebrows. His hand was on the wall above her head, he was standing very close to her. Their faces were so close to each other that Stella could feel his fresh minty breath on her face, feeling something tingling inside but ignoring it for the moment. “Is she okay with that?”_

_“She has to be okay with that” Stella strictly corrected him, smiling. “I got grounded covering for her ass, so in return, she has to cover for my ass.” Aiden smiled and leaned in for a kiss, but Stella pulled away. And as Aiden kept looking at her with wide open eyes, Stella explained. “You have a class in a minute.”_

_“Yeah, I really don’t care about that right now” Aiden reacted, his lips near hers._

_“I think you should” Stella said, trying so hard not to smile as she knew what was going to happen. “Because…”_

_And the door opened, showing them the girl with long strawberry blonde hair and green eyes. She had a soft make-up on as she was wearing a beautiful red dress. “Because…” Aiden tilted his head down, still his hands on the wall above Stella’s hand who was now smiling as she was looking at the young girl in front of the door looking at them. “You were supposed to meet with Lydia. Since you both have a free period.”_

_“Good solve, sherlock” Lydia said sarcastically._

_Aiden looked at Stella and then back to Lydia. “Yeah, I’m just gonna go and leave you two” he murmured, pulling himself away from Stella and walked out of the closet. He stood right in front of the door and looked at Stella. “See you in-”_

_Stella nodded, interrupting him. “Yeah, see you then” she murmured. Aiden pressed his lips together, nodded his head one time and walked away to meet with his brother. Meanwhile, Lydia kept glancing at Stella meaningfully. “What?” Stella said, smirking. “Biology class with Mr. Harris always sucks anyway.”_

_And during lunchbreak, they were all sitting on one picnic table. Stiles, Lydia, and Isaac were sitting on one side and Allison, Scott and Stella were on the other side. Things between Scott and Allison were still rocky but after everything they were trying to be friends but sitting between them definitely felt awkward for Stella._

_“I’m not wearing just hoodies and flannels” Stiles protested. He was still there, arguing about it and probably the only reason he felt so offended by it because it was true, and he was just bored. Lydia chuckled, not even wanting to say something. Isaac simply didn’t care. And the others just smiled at him._

_Stella opened her mouth to say something, but someone acted before her. “Yeah, you wear sweatpants and a t-shirt once in a while to mix things up” she said teasingly. Stella looked up to see it was Stiles’ childhood friend Ary._

_“I love her” Stella said looking at Ary and then turned to Stiles. “I love her and we’re keeping her.” As they all laughed, Stiles was looking at Stella in disbelief._

_“Are you kidding me?” he asked. He actually adored Ary and loved her but right now it was all just too personal. Stiles looked at Ary. “You’re literally wearing a hoodie and jeans right now.”_

_“Yeah, well” Stella said, straightening her back up. “She looks amazing in it.”_

_“Thank you…” Ary stopped not knowing her name._

_“Stella” she introduced herself with a smile._

_“I’m Ary. Nice to meet you Stella.” They shook hands. Ary looked at Stiles. “Well, it’s nice to have someone who appreciates you.”_

_“I appreciate you. I just find you highly annoying sometimes” Stiles fought back._

_“Sometimes as in when I tell the truth?” she questioned causing Stella to laugh. But Ary shook her head and shrugged. “Well, I’m not here to talk to you about your flannels anyway. I’m here to talk to Scott about our Econ homework.” Scott laughed at them and he looked at the girl he knew from Stiles. As they started having their small chat, Stiles looked at Stella shaking his head in disbelief and grabbed some more fries, stuffing them into his mouth. Stella shook her head and looked at Isaac as she suddenly needed to ask him something._

_Aiden pushed Stella against the lockers as their lips were moving on each other possessively. His hands were moving between her brown hair, Stella’s hands were on his back. She had no idea how they got to this point. One minute they were talking about tonight, and next thing she knew they both ditched their classes and ripping each other’s clothes off in the locker room._

_Of course, she wasn’t complaining. She enjoyed their make-out sessions during school time. All the rush and the adrenaline were amazing as much as Aiden was amazing at kissing._

_He pulled his lips away, pausing the rough and passionate kisses for just a second to take her red top off. After her shirt, Stella took his shirt off quickly. Their lips touched again, moving on each other with the same rhythm. Aiden grabbed her by her legs, pulling her body up to his lap carrying and taking all of her weight on himself. He pushed her against the locker once again, not breaking the kiss._

_But then, they heard a noise. They stopped, not making a sound. Their eyes were wide open, hearing footsteps. “Whoever is there, show yourself! And better have clothes on!”_

_“Shit” Aiden murmured while they were both pressing their lips together not to laugh as they heard Coach’s angry and frustrated his own kind of voice. Aiden put Stella down, grabbed her shirt and smiled as he handed it over. “I’ll go, you wait here.” Stella nodded as she watched him walk up to the Coach, holding his t-shirt. “Sorry, coach. It’s just me” he said as Stella rested her back against the locker. She got chills as her naked back met the metal of the locker but after few seconds, she didn’t feel nothing as she listened in on Aiden and the Coach._

_“Ethan or Aiden?” Coach asked, confused. “I can’t tell you two apart.” Aiden said his name, Stella heard Coach murmur something but couldn’t quite catch what it was. “Ah, anyway. So, you and your brother finally decided to join our lacrosse team, huh?”_

_“Coach, I-”_

_“Okay, okay, I get it” he said, gesturing with his body that he understood. “You need more time. I got it. Think about it, consider it.” Aiden nodded, flashing him a believable smile. Coach turned around, meant to leave the locker room but then he stopped hallway through, looked at Aiden again. “Oh, and also… Stella, you need to submit your Econ paper tomorrow.” Stella pressed her lips together, closing her eyes. As she quickly put the shirt she was holding between her hands back on her body, Aiden moved on his spot nervously but didn’t say anything as Coach continued. “You got that? Don’t forget that!”_

_“Yes, Coach! Got it, thank you!” Stella shouted causing Aiden to smile as he shook his head. Coach nodded and left them alone. Aiden walked back to her with a smile. “We got busted.”_

_“It’s okay, I love you” Aiden said. Stella’s smile froze on her face not understanding what’s happening. The atmosphere around her started glitching to a darker color. Stella looked around, confused as hell._

_“Aiden, what the-” She noticed the wound on his stomach when she looked back at him. She gasped, taking a step back. His stomach was covered in blood, and the atmosphere around them was definitely darker. “Aiden, what’s going on?”_

_“I love you, Stella. It’s okay.” His voice came out more husky, more hurt, and definitely harder than before. Stella’s heart started beating faster, her breathings got shallower. She had no idea what was happening and then, to make it worse, through the school speakers, she heard Allison’s voice._

_“Tell Stella that I love her.” Allison’s wounded murmur reached out to Stella whose lips fell apart. Her heart was pounding inside her chest like it was gonna burst out. Aiden was still standing in front of her with a sword wound, blood all over him. “That I love her so much. No matter what. I love her.”_

_“What the hell?” Stella murmured, almost crying. She turned around, ran her way out of the locker room. She started walking fast in the halls. There was no one. She could hear Lydia screaming inside her head, in her mind. “ALLISON!” But other than that she was alone. The hallway was dark, there was no light. There was a cold wind around her_

_And then she saw them._

_Allison was on the ground; Scott was holding her. He was crying over her body. “It’s okay. It’s perfect. I’m in the arms of my first love. First person I’ve ever loved, the person I’ll always love…” Stella could see her lips moving, her eyes on Scott, talking but her voice was echoing through the hallway, through the speakers. “It’s okay. It’s perfect.” Stella’s breathing was faster, shallow. She turned around, sobbing._

_But something else was there._

_This time, Aiden was on the ground. Ethan was holding him, crying over his brother. “Does it hurt you as much as it hurts me?” This question was repeating through the speakers now. “Does it hurt you as much as it hurts me?... It’s okay… You’re okay…”_

_Stella’s head started to spin. She turned around, trying to find a way out as she remembered everything that happened. They were dead, everything was a lie. It wasn’t real. They were dead. They were gone. She was all alone._

_“It’s okay. It’s perfect… Because it doesn’t hurt.”_

_“Does it hurt you as much as it hurts me?... I love you Stella.”_

_“I’m in the arms of my first love. I love you. Scott… Scott McCall… Tell Stella that I love her. No matter what. Make sure she never forgets that.”_

_Stella closed her eyes shut, pressed her hands to her ears to block the sounds and the voices that were coming from the speakers around the hallway. It was almost like they were everywhere, around her. She started murmuring to herself. “Stop. Stop, please, stop” she begged._

_Then she heard someone else’s voice ringing inside her ears. Isaac… “You have to wake up” he said calmly. Stella opened her eyes, seeing Isaac. His curly hair… His worried, wide open blue eyes looking softly at Stella._

_Then Derek joined him. “You have to wake up Stella” he told her causing Stella to turn to look at him. His green eyes were sad, looking at her. He was worried about the young girl as if he knew something. “Wake up.”_

_“Wake up” Isaac said again as Stella’s world started to turn._

_“Stella, you have to wake up.” Derek’s voice echoed through the school hallway._

_“Wake up” Isaac murmured this time._

_“Stella…” Young Argent heard Derek’s voice. He grabbed her by the arm, stopping her from turning around herself. “Stella!” he said firmly, causing her to look at him right in the eye. “Wake up!”_

Stella woke up, gasping with Derek’s voice echoing inside her brain. She held onto her seat, looking around, trying to understand where she was. “Hey, hey, hey, calm down” she heard someone saying but she was too distracted to focus on anything right now. She could feel the wetness underneath her eyes. She looked around, blinking. She was in the plane, but the plane wasn’t in the air. She took a deep breath, looked at the flight attendant who woke her up. “You okay?” Stella didn’t answer, she looked at the outside from the tiny plane window.

It was a rainy, heavily rainy day in London. The sky was dark. She looked down at her phone, the clock was showing three in the morning. So, it meant she slept for only 2 hours which was surprising, considering her long-ass nightmare. But it was a normal night for her. She had those a lot, ever since she was a little kid. She was used to them. It was a normal night for the young girl.

Well, almost a normal night for her… At least she had Allison, even Aiden with her only few days ago and now… She was all alone. “Yeah,” she pushed herself to say, and pushing the thoughts away. “Yeah, I’m okay. I’m… I’ll be okay.”

“Alright, sweetheart, but the plane landed, so if you’re okay…” The flight attendant forced a smile since she was also very tired due to 12 hours of flying from California to London. “You need to get out.”

Stella nodded, stood up from her seat and walked out of the plane. She grabbed her stuff and quickly walked outside the airport to the place where she was supposed to meet Jackson. And she saw him the minute she stepped outside.

She ran to hug him. “Hey, you okay?” Jackson asked, holding her tight. He knew what happened, he got the text and he cried but right now, he had to be there for Stella. After everything he’s been through and how much she helped him, he couldn’t be a dick to her. Not at a time like this.

Stella pulled away. “Yeah, sure let’s say I am” she responded and then quickly continued, pushing away the thought and how okay she wasn’t. There were things she had to do. She couldn’t mourn, she couldn’t cry more. She couldn’t think about the whole messed up nightmare. She had to focus on something else, anything else so that she wouldn’t lose it more. She sighed, keeping her gaze on Jackson. “But I need your help.”

“What do you mean?” he questioned, looking at her. “What kind of help?”

Stella took a deep breath, wetted her lips. “We have to find where La Loba is” she explained.

“What the hell is a La Loba?” he asked, scowling. He was definitely confused by the name.

Stella sighed, looked in Jackson’s green eyes. “My mom” she responded. “La Loba is my mom.”


End file.
